


In Fate's Hands

by JBankai89



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe, Canon Divergence, Character Death, Cross-Generation Relationship, Dom/sub, Emotional Trauma, Implied/Referenced Infanticide, M/M, Minor Character Death, Mpreg, Questionable ethics, Stockholm Syndrome, Violence, Werewolf Harry, Werewolves, dubcon, elements of noncon, grey characterization, non-consensual abortion
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-05-20
Updated: 2019-04-28
Packaged: 2019-05-09 10:42:54
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 24
Words: 98,289
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14714540
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JBankai89/pseuds/JBankai89
Summary: In all of Dumbledore's wildest philosophies, he never could have predicted Harry's reaction to the truth of his fate. Similarly, Harry could never have predicted how much his mentor would demand of him.Instead of obeying the prophecy, Harry runs. Unfortunately for him, Fate has a strange way of catching up with you, regardless how hard you try to escape it.





	1. Breaking Point

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: I've been working on this fic for nearly two years, and I'm still not sure about it, but I hope that that is less from the quality of this story, and more to the fact that I've been staring at it for 14 months, being totally uncertain whether or not to post it. I hope you guys like it. This fic will have alternating POVs (see page breaks ~*~), which I think I did an okay job of making the distinction, but if anyone finds it confusing, let me know and I'll fix it. 
> 
> In the first few chapters a lot of dialogue is pulled directly from DH word-for-word, and this fic is 99.99999% canon-compliant, except for like the last three chapters and epilogue. The first two chapters will jump POV very frequently, given that a lot is going on, but as the story progresses it won't be as frequent. If anyone has read my other werewolf fics, the werewolf lore for this one will be similar, but not exactly the same (a few different rules here and there).
> 
>  
> 
> **Warning: This fic contains character death. While the characters I kill off are minor to this particular story, they are main and secondary characters in the canon books, but not one of the Golden Trio, I promise. There are also a bunch of other triggers and things in this story that would be upsetting to certain people, so be mindful of any bolded notes you see on chapters going forward(anyone who had read my work before knows that when I say that, I'm definitely not bluffing :P.**
> 
>  
> 
> Final note: I really like the Fanon Fenrir over the Canon Fenrir, meaning he's a bad guy but he's not a bad guy, so my Fen is a little nicer than the canon one, but I tried to not deviate too much.
> 
> This fic will be updated every two weeks until the first draft is complete, when I will move up to weekly updates. The next update will be June 3rd.
> 
> Italicized text at the beginning of the chapter is from 'Chapter Thirty-Four – The Forest Again' from Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling, and there are several passages throughout this chapter that uses dialogue from the chapters following it.

 

Chapter One – Breaking Point

 

“ _The ones you think guard you are out for your blood.”_

_Antivist – Bring Me The Horizon (Sempiternal, Epitaph Records, 2013)_

 

_Finally, the truth. Lying with his face pressed into the dusty carpet of the office where he had once thought he was learning the secrets of victory, Harry understood at last that he was not supposed to survive. His job was to walk calmly into Death's welcoming arms. Along the way, he was to dispose of Voldemort's remaining links to life, so that when at last he flung himself across Voldemort's path, and did not raise a wand to defend himself, the end would be clean, and the job that ought to have been done in Godric's Hollow would be finished: neither would live, neither could survive._

 

But _why_?

Harry rose to his feet, his heart pounding hard in his chest. His gaze fell upon Dumbledore's portrait, empty in the midst of the battle.

“How can you ask this of me?” Harry asked the empty frame, but none too surprisingly, it did not answer.

Rage filled him as he stared at the blank portrait. How could Dumbledore, his mentor, _ask_ him to give up his life for this? Had he not given enough already? His parents, Cedric, Sirius, Moody, Dobby, Fred, Snape...when was enough _enough_ for this man? When Harry was nothing but a corpse, would _that_ be enough for him?

“I'm seventeen years old,” Harry said, his voice raising to something close to a shout. “ _Seventeen!_ How could you ask me to do this?”

And that was the truth—the crux of the matter.

Harry was seventeen years old.

He didn't want to die.

Tears blinding his gaze, Harry's mind seemed to shatter.

The wizarding world could _burn_ for all he cared.

He'd had enough—he'd _given_ enough.

Harry drew his invisibility cloak over himself, cast one final glare at the empty frame, and ran.

He didn't care that there was one Horcrux remaining; Ron and Hermione could deal with it, Neville could, _someone_. As far as Harry was concerned, he'd done enough.

Heart in his throat Harry ran harder, uncaring that likely his ankles and feet could be seen as the cloak flapped around him, ignoring the way his legs burned in protest at the hard pace that he set for himself.

It was pitifully easy to slip from the castle, run to the gates, and step through them virtually unnoticed.

Once beyond Hogwarts' protective wards, he Disapparated, and as he did so, he shed all his concerns for the world who wanted so much of him, and never before had such an action felt so freeing.

 

~*~

 

Fenrir Greyback stood with the Death Eaters, a cloak drawn over him his shoulders. The fabric felt heavy and irritating to his skin; he couldn't _breathe_ in this damn thing. The so-called Dark Lord stood in the centre of the clearing with his inner circle. A gust of wind tousled their robes, lifted their hair. No one noticed it; no one had much call to.

Except Fenrir.

That _scent_.

The scent of a human, certainly, unimpressive to be sure. But that scent spoke to him; _called_ to him.

He hungered for it.

Fenrir could recall that same scent up in the tower, the night that doddering old fool was struck down by Snape. It was stronger now, matured. His mouth watered at what he longed to do to the human giving off that scent.

Just as abruptly, it disappeared, and Fenrir growled lowly. _Damn wizards and their Apparition._

He'd survive this, he knew that. He had not made it this far to die _now._ Then, he would find that human, and claim him.

 

“No sign of him, my Lord,” said Dolohov suddenly, drawing Fenrir out of his bubble of thought.

The fury of the Dark Lord was a quiet thing. It was not in crazed anger like many of his followers. It was in simple, quick motions. His red eyes flared at his minion's words.

“My Lord—”

Bellatrix tumbled to the ground with a moan following her words, the Dark Lord's wand pointing at her. Her face was bloodied, it sounded, too, as though she was choking on the stuff, but her vocal reaction was the same as though he'd offered her a tender caress.

“I thought he would come,” he said, red eyes flickering in the firelight as he lifted the curse and caressed the wand he held tenderly, “I expected him to come.”

Fenrir wondered if that scent could have possibly belonged to—he shook his head, banishing the ridiculous thought. No. Potter was never one to flee.

“I was, it seems...mistaken.”

No one spoke. It would seem that his followers were as terrified as that bound and bloodied oaf, Hag—something? He hadn't cared to listen. Fenrir reigned in the urge to vocalize his discontent with an impatient growl. He had a human to track; he had no time for this.

“I've no wish to spill more magical blood,” the Dark Lord continued, not casting a glance towards his followers as he spoke, “but an example must be made. You,” his voice hissed at the enormous man, and the half-giant flinched. “Move.”

Forcing the giant man ahead of him, he was herded from the clearing and back towards the castle.

 

~*~

 

Neville was sitting with Ron and Hermione in the Great Hall. Hermione's face was tear-stained as she held on to Ron, staring blankly at the line of the dead. So many people they had known and loved, gone, forever. It burned within Neville. It wasn't _fair_.

“Why hasn't Harry come back yet?” Hermione whispered softly, “you don't think he went off to face You-Know-Who by himself, do you?”

“I hope he's okay,” Ron said, his gaze stuck on the still face of his older brother, apparently unable to go any closer and join his mourning family members. Hermione sat up suddenly, sniffled sharply, and brushed the remaining tears from her cheeks.

“What if he's not, though?” she asked Ron, and looked at Neville significantly. Ron's eyebrows shot up in surprise.

“I dunno Hermione...I don't think Harry would want—”

“—Harry's not here, Ron. If something _has_ happened, we need someone to carry on the—the task, in case we—” she broke down again, and Ron nodded, his face set.

“What are you two on about?” Neville finally asked, eyeing them both with confusion. When Hermione had calmed down, she turned to face Neville, her hand clutching tightly to Ron's.

“It's about...what we were doing this year. A task Dumbledore left Harry to do,” Hermione said, her voice still shaking a little, “it was all leading to this, to be able to kill You-Know-Who, and we're so close. In order to kill him, we need to first kill his snake. Then it can be over.”

“His snake?” Neville repeated, and the pair nodded. “Why?”

“It's a long story, Neville,” Ron said tiredly, “if we survive this, I promise we'll explain it all, but for now—”

Ron broke off suddenly when a thunderous voice abruptly filled the mournful silence.

“Harry Potter has run away,” the voice of Voldemort boomed, eliciting several gasps and screams of fright from the people in the hall. “Harry Potter has fled to save his own skin, while you lay down your lives for him. Cast your little charms to validate my words if you must.

“The battle is won. You have lost half of your fighters. My Death Eaters outnumber you and the Boy Who Lived has abandoned you. There must be no more war. Anyone who continues to resist, man, woman or child, will be slaughtered, as will every member of their family. Come out of the castle, now, kneel before me, and you shall be spared. Your parents and children, your brothers and sisters will live, and be forgiven, and you will join me in the new world we shall build together.”

Silence followed the proclamation.

Harry, abandon them?

He wouldn't. He _couldn't_.

Neville turned to McGonagall and Flitwick, who were casting a number of spells with hasty, jerky movements, their eyes wide with fright. When they shook their heads, several people gasped with fright. Hermione clapped her hands to her mouth as she uttered a small scream. Ron seemed to be frozen into stunned silence.

 

~*~

 

It took a great deal of strength for Fenrir to maintain a stony exterior throughout the Dark Lord's speech; he was absolutely _certain_ that this would not play out in the human's favour. Something had changed, Fenrir could smell it. His humanity—what was left of it, anyway—was tethered to this world by a thread—spider silk in the face of a vicious storm. This wasn't his fight, not anymore.

The humans could have their skirmish, Fenrir decided. He had more important things to do.

Fenrir slipped from the procession. No one seemed to notice his disappearance, and he smirked to himself as he threw off the robes he'd been forced into, and stared up at the sliver of the moon as it bathed the werewolf with faint light. He chuckled and employed the power that precious few werewolves possessed—the ability to change at will.

Pain beyond pain engulfed him. His gums ached, his skin split, his bones snapped and reset. With a low snarl, the huge wolf wove through the trees and towards the village, his nose high as he followed the scent.

Scent for a werewolf however went well beyond the physical aspect of _smell_ , which was lucky. The magic this human had employed had left a mark.

And that was something he could follow.

With a soft snarl akin to a cry of victory, Fenrir dove into the shadows at a run, and faded into the dark.

 

~*~

 

Harry materialized in the high grasses of the Scottish countryside, and by his calculation not too far from Hogwarts. From such a great distance, he couldn't see the castle any longer—not that he cared to. He'd sneak back to Hogsmeade soon and pilfer a copy of the _Daily Prophet_ to find out what had become of his friends. For now, he needed to get away, _far_ away. No one was going to turn him into a sacrificial lamb. _No one._

He stepped grass and into a thick wooded area. It seemed to be some sort of forest sanctuary, and even in the dead of night, it was alight with activity.

Harry kept the cloak drawn tightly around himself and slowed his pace to ensure that he would not fall nor have any potential vagrants catch sight of his feet. He knew that he needed food and shelter, but wandering into a muggle motel seemed to be a bad idea, and Harry hoped that using a cave would be all right.

Harry found a sense of peace as he walked, the only accompaniment to his footfalls being the soft rustle of nighttime animals around him. The weight of his responsibilities abandoned, he felt freer than he had in years. He did not have it in him to even concern himself with the well-being of his friends. What would happen, would happen. He would not give himself up, not for this.

After close to an hour, and finding no means of shelter, he began to wonder if maybe he could construct something, there were enough fallen branches and leaf litter to build a lean-to of some kind. His musings were cut short however when the silence was broken by a snarling of a wild animal. Harry turned in alarm, and came face-to-face with a creature he'd only seen once before, and had no desire to ever again.

A werewolf.

 

~*~

 

Neville led the remaining DA members outside with Ron and Hermione next to him. It felt very strange to lead like this. He could not tell whether he was more terrified at what he was about to face, or infuriated at Harry's betrayal. _How could he do this to us?_ He wondered. After everything, at the key moment, _why_ would Harry leave?

They descended the castle's crumbling steps, and Neville felt his stomach lurch at the state of Hagrid, who was leading the procession of Death Eaters, shining tears upon his face. He heard Ron and Hermione let out soft noises of distress. Everyone knew they were very close to the teacher and gamekeeper, it was likely difficult to see him like this. Neville did his best to keep his face blank. He needed to be strong for the others—like Harry would have been.

Voldemort circled to Hagrid's side, the snake Ron and Hermione had mentioned draped over his shoulders, and paid no mind to the assembled crowd. He lifted his wand, and a silvery substance drifted from the wand's tip, forming in midair into a wickedly sharp blade. Neville moved to shut his eyes, but not quickly enough. Voldemort flicked the wand one more time, and the blade flew at Hagrid, before the half-giant even had a chance to be surprised, his head was separated cleanly from his shoulders. Hermione screamed.

“No!”

“ _No!”_

“Hagrid! _Hagrid!_ ”

Anguished cries of students, teachers, and parents alike filled the silence as the beloved half-giant's body buckled and fell to the ground, the blank eyes of the severed head rolling to a stop at Voldemort's feet. The cries rose, shifting from sorrow to anger, shooting verbal abuse at Voldemort and his Death Eaters until—

“SILENCE!” Voldemort cried, raising his wand again and aiming it at the assembled crowd in a sweeping arc, but this time McGonagall rose to the cause, and stopped the curse from hitting them. They fell silent.

“Do you now see?” Voldemort asked, “the same will become of you if you do not submit to me, now. Your precious Harry Potter has abandoned you to your doom.”

“He beat you!” Ron shouted, and the cries and yells of the students, teachers, and others rose again in volume. Voldemort brandished his wand, forcing silence upon them all again.

“He abandoned you to save his own skin!” Voldemort shrieked, “ran away, instead of facing me—”

Neville had heard enough, and with an angry cry, he broke away from the others, and tore forward. He wasn't quick enough and Voldemort flicked his wand at him, disarming him and casting him to the ground with another curse.

“And who's this?” Voldemort hissed, and Neville felt his skin crawl at the sound of it. It terrified him, but his rage, anguish, and grief had bolstered his courage. He refused to back down from this monster. Not now. “Who has volunteered to demonstrate what happens to those who continue to fight when the battle is lost?”

Neville's eyes shifted down the line of Death Eaters when he heard a familiar delighted laugh. Bellatrix. He gritted his teeth, and his fingers dug into the grass.

“It is Neville Longbottom, my Lord! The boy who has been giving the Carrows so much trouble! The son of the Aurors, remember?”

The sound of her voice burned in him, and Neville no longer even felt his fear. He was too angry for that. He stood on shaking limbs as Voldemort spoke again.

“Ah, yes, I remember,” Voldemort said, looking down at Neville as though he was nothing more than an irritating fly. “but you are a pureblood, aren't you, my brave boy?” Neville clenched his hands into fists.

“So what if I am?” Neville all but shouted. He had to do this, in Harry's stead. Whatever had happened, Harry had to have a reason for leaving. He _had_ to. Until he got back, Neville was determined to be as brave as Harry would have been.

“You show spirit, and bravery, and you come of noble stock. You will make a very valuable Death Eater. We need your kind, Neville Longbottom,” said Voldemort silkily.

“I'll join when hell freezes over,” Neville snarled without a moment's hesitation, “Dumbledore's Army!” he cried, and the surviving DA members responded with a cheer.

“Very well,” Voldemort said in that same smooth tone, and something in it made Neville's courage falter. “If that is your choice, Longbottom, we revert to the original plan. On your head,” he said quietly, “so be it.”

 

~*~

 

Harry stood frozen in the face of the enormous creature.

It was vastly different from Remus's wolf form. It was bigger— _much_ bigger, in fact, and it was jet black. The only spark of colour upon it was its glinting ice-blue eyes. Despite all his studies however, in his panic, Harry couldn't remember what to do when confronted with one.

 _Hang on_ , Harry thought with a small shake of his head, _the moon is nowhere near full. What's going on?_

He had hesitated too long however, and the creature leapt at him. Harry did not even have enough time to try scrambling out of the way, and he let out a terrified scream as heavy paws collided with his chest, forcing him to the ground. His head knocked against a tree trunk and he saw stars.

 _I guess the Fates are punishing me for being such a coward,_ Harry thought without humour, _I'm gonna die anyway. At least I know that Voldemort will go down, one way or the other._

The creature bore down upon him, one paw holding him down while he lowered himself towards Harry, hot stinking breath choking him as it closed its huge, powerful jaws around his right shoulder. It bit through bone and cartilage, through tissue, tendon, and muscle, and Harry let out a blood-curdling scream as his scar exploded with pain.

 

~*~

 

Voldemort lifted his wand, and he summoned something from one of the broken windows of the castle. Neville couldn't tell what it was at first, but as it zoomed closer, he realized with a jolt that it was the old Sorting Hat.

“There will be no more Sorting at Hogwarts School,” said Voldemort. “There will be no more houses. The emblem, shield, and colours of my noble ancestor, Salazar Slytherin, will suffice for everyone, won't they, Neville Longbottom?”

Neville couldn't even gasp in his shock as he felt Voldemort point his wand at him and freeze his body. Neville's heart thudded in his chest as Voldemort stepped forward and forced the hat down over his eyes. With only sound to aid him, he listened to Voldemort address the crowd.

“Neville here is now going to demonstrate what happens to anyone foolish enough to continue to oppose me,” Voldemort said.

Neville new nothing next but pain. Blistering, burning pain. The curse did not let him even scream, then around him pandemonium erupted.

The ground shook, and a thundering voice broke the silence.

“HAGGAR!”

Neville knew that this was Grawp, Hagrid's half-brother, and he heard the thunderous approach of the centaurs follow him. At the same time, something hard and metal hit him very suddenly on the top of his head, and he saw stars.

The Body-Bind curse inexplicably broke, the flames disappeared, and Neville yanked the hat off his head, drawing from it a silver sword, the hilt glittering with inset rubies.

Neville did not stop to marvel at the weapon, or wonder where it came from, but acted at once. With one swift motion he turned and cut the snake's head from its body, and Voldemort's infuriated shriek was lost in the din of the battle rekindling anew.

Ron and Hermione found him and dragged him out of Voldemort's sight, just as a bright green curse burnt a hole in the grass where Neville had stood not a second before, and the would-be Dark Lord was lost in the chaos. Where had he gone? Neville couldn't quite explain it, but he had to finish it.

Inexplicably, Neville knew that _he_ had to end it.

 

~*~

 

Harry did not know where he was, and only had a dim inkling of _who_ he was. He stared up, and everything was white, almost blindingly so.

Harry supposed he had to be _some_ where, given that he could feel that he was lying upon something hard—a floor, or the ground; he wasn't certain. Slowly he sat up, but he found no pain where he expected it to be. He lifted a hand to his naked shoulder. Why did he expect to see it mangled? He shook his head, but his memories were still foggy

It occurred to Harry dimly that he was naked, and there was a strange vulnerability to that. He rather wished that he had clothes, and just as suddenly he found himself in his old school robes. He stood up and felt his face, and realized that he was no longer wearing his glasses, nor, it seemed, did he need them.

Harry had been quite certain that he was alone in wherever this place was, but a soft choking, wailing noise permeated the stillness. He approached the direction of the sound cautiously.

As he walked, the place seemed to take form slowly. A high, domed ceiling materialized above him, but the space still seemed to stretch out endlessly in either direction. It was an expansive space, but there were limits to it; metaphorical walls. Harry couldn't see them, but somehow, he knew that they were there.

Harry reached the source of the noise at last, turned towards it, and recoiled with a gasp of disgust.

Curled on the floor was a creature. It was foetus-like, with viscous fluids in red and black clinging to its grey-tinged flesh. Harry felt like he should recognize it, and somehow know it. Harry took a tentative step forward.

“You cannot help.”

Harry spun around. Albus Dumbledore stood there in robes of midnight blue, with a creature at his side—a black wolf with green eyes.

“Harry,” Dumbledore said, spreading his arms wide in welcome. “You wonderful boy. You brave, brave, man. Come, let us walk.”

Harry hesitated. He did not think he deserved the praise. He'd done nothing brave or wonderful. He'd _run_. The guilt gripped him, but Dumbledore's twinkling eyes and gentle smile did not waver. Eventually he gave in, and fell into step with his mentor and his betrayer.

“But you're dead,” Harry said suddenly, his voice edged with a tremble.

“Oh yes,” said Dumbledore matter-of-factly.

“Then...I'm dead too?”

“Ah,” said Dumbledore, still smiling at him warmly, while the wolf bracketed him in, its nose bumping against Harry's palm gently, as though asking to be pet. “That is the question, isn't it? On the whole, my dear boy, I think not.”

Harry stared.

“Not?” Harry asked.

“Not,” Dumbledore confirmed.

“But...” Harry's fingers moved to his shoulder, and brushed over the unmarked flesh. “How can you even _look_ at me? I ran. I abandoned everyone. I—I...I failed, Professor. And then that werewolf attacked me...” He shook his head, the memories were flooding into his mind so quickly that he began to feel a little dizzy.

“Harry, my boy,” Dumbledore said, slowing to a stop as he rested a hand on Harry's shoulder. He looked up miserably into his lined face, still regarding him with a warm smile. “I was so fixated upon the end, defeating Voldemort once and for all, it was _I_ who failed you. I failed to remember that you may be an adult by law, but you are still very much a child. Everyone has their breaking point, and I asked too much of you, more than I had any right to ask. However, life has a funny way of working itself out, and as it would turn out, werewolf venom, like basilisk venom, is one of the few things that _can_ destroy a Horcrux. I could not do that to you, thrust upon you such a life, and thus never even entertained the idea. I can imagine you understand why.”

Harry's throat felt tight as he nodded a little.

“Yeah, I do,” Harry said, “that's sort of moot now, don't you think?”

“Indeed.”

“So then...his piece of his soul...” Harry turned to look to where the thing had been, but was now an empty space. “It's gone?”

“Oh yes!” said Dumbledore, “Yes, Mr Greyback's bite destroyed it. Your soul is whole, and completely your own, Harry.”

“Wait, that was _Greyback_?” Harry demanded, and shook his head again as he tried to decide what was the more pertinent thing to ask. “And...wait, I'm...if I'm not dead, and I wake up, I won't be human any more, will I?” he asked, and Dumbledore's expression fell a little.

“Should you choose to wake, indeed, you will no longer be human,” Dumbledore replied. The wolf at Harry's side bumped him gently, almost consolingly.

“Choose?” Harry asked.

“You may return, or you could choose...to go on,” Dumbledore said simply.

“On?” Harry asked.

“On.”

“On to where?”

“Now that would be telling, wouldn't it?” Dumbledore asked, smiling at him warmly.

Harry's fingers tangled in the fur at the creature's scruff.

“If I go back, things won't be...I mean, it'll be...” Harry broke off and shook his head, his mind a jumble as he thought to what awaited him.

Life as a werewolf, and as a betrayer.

But if he _did_ go back, was there even any chance of making anything any better?

Harry turned to look back at the thing; it seemed so faraway now.

“Do not pity the dead, Harry. Pity the living, and, above all, those who live without love. By returning, you may find that the path is not as dark as it seems. I do believe that whether you choose to return and fight, or disappear into the ether, Voldemort will be finished. Life and Fate, they have a funny way of working themselves out when we least expect them to.”

Harry sighed. He did not want to leave. It was warm and light and peaceful here, and if he woke it would be to darkness, despair, and maybe something worse. But he also knew that he _had_ to return.

King's Cross slowly materialized around him further, but like with everything else here, it had a surreal iridescence to it. The train in the station was as white as the benches, the platforms, and the billowing steam from the engine.

With the wolf still at his side, Harry took a step towards the train. He paused and turned back to Dumbledore one last time.

“Tell me one last thing,” said Harry, “Is this real? Or has this been happening inside my head?”

Dumbledore beamed at him.

“Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?”

 


	2. Traitors and Saviours

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Next update will be June 17th. Thank you guys so much for the lovely comments here and via Tumblr. I hope this second chapter lives up to your expectations! :)
> 
> Content Warning: Violence, references to rape but no -actual- rape.

Chapter Two – Traitors and Saviours

 

Neville wasn't certain what had happened.

One moment, Voldemort was bearing down on them, and the next he had disappeared.

Neville snatched up his wand off the ground and brandished the sword in his opposite hand. With Ron and Hermione bracketing him, Neville searched the chaos for the man who had caused so much death, but it was as though he had suddenly vanished, and Neville could not spot him no matter where he looked, until Ron suddenly cried, “there!” and pointed to the centre of the chaos.

His inner circle surrounded him, and Neville could recognize a few of them. Bellatrix in particular, as his hand tensed around his wand as he caught sight of her. It seemed as though they were helping him up, but certainly someone would have noticed if Voldemort suddenly passed out, wouldn't they?

“Come on,” Neville said, “let's finish this. For Harry?”

“For Harry,” both Ron and Hermione replied at the same time.

Neville ran just ahead of them, Hermione and Ron casting Shield Charms as they wove through Order members, giants, centaurs, and Death Eaters while they made a beeline for Voldemort. Bellatrix had been distracted by Ginny and Luna, and though Neville longed to be the one to duel her, he needed to do what needed to be done.

He needed to stop Voldemort.

 

“Neville Longbottom,” Voldemort said silkily as the trio approached. “So good to see you up and about again. Have you reconsidered my offer?”

“Never in a million years, Voldemort,” Neville said at once, lifting his wand.

“You dare to speak my name?” he hissed, and Neville lifted the sword in his other hand.

“Yeah I dare,” Neville responded. “You're _nothing_ any more, you hear me? Nothing! You're barely alive, you're barely even human! Nothing is tethering you to this world anymore, and Harry might not be here to finish you off, but I am.”

“Your blessed traitor,” Voldemort sneered, “he fled, leaving you to fight his battles. Why would you do _anything_ for him?”

“Harry would never do that!” Hermione spat at him, “he would never abandon his friends; he would never leave—not without good reason. Whatever the reason now, you can be _sure_ that his only plan is to kill _you._ ”

“And where is he now?” Voldemort taunted, “where is your blessed hero? I do not see your precious _Boy Who Lived_. What hope does your feeble Order have now?”

“They've got _me_ ,” Neville said, and he was amazed at how little of the statement was bravado.

He threw up his wand, while Hermione and Ron did the same. As Neville's Stunning Spell shot from his wand, unable to muster up the nerve to use a Killing Curse, he heard Ron and Hermione on either side of him shout something—he wasn't certain what—just as a jet of green light headed straight for them. Neville planted his feet apart as he braced himself, and stared as the most curious thing happened.

More jets of light flew around them, and straight for Voldemort. Neville kept his wand hand steady as his head whirled around, and he gaped when he saw not just Ron and Hermione, but what seemed like most of the Order standing at their backs, shooting their own curses at Voldemort at the same time.

Neville turned back around, and He watched as the hail of spells shot towards Voldemort, the monster's own Killing Curse aimed at them, and all the spells seemed to collide with the jet of green light, and they watched, mouths agape with shock as the spells combined rebounded the curse right back at its caster.

Time seemed to freeze, Voldemort's mouth open in shock, and they watched as he fell back, his body hitting the ground with a mundane finality, his body withered and shrunken, a mortal death for the terror of the wizarding world.

Neville at last looked up. Not far away Molly Weasley stood over the corpse of Bellatrix Lestrange, marks of curses, dust, and soot on every face, while the remaining Death Eaters stood frozen in shock.

An ear-splitting roar filled the stillness, people cheering, people crying, and Neville stared, stunned and amazed as he, Ron and Hermione were hoisted up upon someone's shoulders (the crowd was too thick to discern who) and Neville exchanged a meek smile with the other two. The looks in their eyes told Neville that they were likely thinking the same thing he was—

_This should have been Harry._

 

_~*~_

 

Harry's eyes flickered open, and the first thing he was aware of was that he was surrounded by warmth. His shoulder ached dully, but less like a minutes or hours-old injury, and more like one he'd carried for several years.

It took him several long moments to realize that the warmth he felt was due to the fact that an enormous _werewolf_ had curled itself up around him like a living, breathing pillow.

Hyperventilating a little, Harry looked around wildly as he jerked up and stumbled away from the creature. Not only was it now daytime, but Harry was certain that it was the wrong phase of the moon for this to be even _remotely_ possible. What was going _on_?

Harry looked down at himself to see that the fabric of his T-shirt around his shoulder where he'd been bitten was shredded, and he lifted his hand to touch the scarred bite, but lost his nerve at the last moment, and allowed his arm to drop to the side.

Was he really a werewolf now? It almost didn't seem real.

“I was wondering when you'd wake,” a voice rumbled, and Harry's gaze jerked up as his blood ran cold.

He knew that voice all too well.

Greyback.

The infamous werewolf stood there dressed in nothing but a pair of well-worn jeans and hiking boots. At first, Harry had thought that they were leather, but the way they gleamed a faint green in the sun told him that they were dragonhide.

Greyback looked far too pleased with himself, and Harry took a shaking step back. His hand went for Malfoy's wand, but distantly he knew that werewolves, like giants, were impervious to many kinds of magic, and Harry had no idea what spell he could cast that might even slow someone like Greyback down.

“Stay back,” Harry said, wincing at the tremor that laced his words. Despite the futility of the action, he lifted the wand and pointed it at the older man, but he merely chuckled, apparently amused with Harry's actions.

“What're you gonna do?” he sneered, “ _kill_ me? You haven't the stomach for death, Potter. Whether you like it or not, you need me now. How long do you think you'll last in the wild, a newborn werewolf—a newborn _submissive_ werewolf, at that—and on the run from everyone he once called friends? If the rogues don't catch up with you, your Ministry certainly will. Treason carries a heavy prison sentence, Potter. How long do you think you'll last against the Dementors?”

Harry glared at him, but despite the man's horrific reputation, his words rang with truth. As much as he hated to admit it, he _did_ need him. He hadn't understood the implications behind half of what he had said, and that alone made him more than a little nervous.

“How d'you mean, _submissive werewolf_?” Harry asked as he continued to point his wand shakily at the werewolf. He didn't like the application of the word _submissive_ to himself; downtrodden, yes, but he'd never taken any of it lying down. His unease grew when Greyback smirked, and took a step forward.

“Funny thing, the magical world,” he said. “It's so full of wonder, especially for a child raised by muggles...in particular how many of the rules of the muggle world simply do not apply to beings such as us.

“For example,” Greyback continued, “if, in a few months, I were to bend you over and fuck that sweet virgin arse of yours, you would find that you now have the capability of bearing my young.”

Harry felt all the colour drain from his face as he took a hurried step back, his wand arm dropping in his shock.

“I—you're lying,” Harry said quickly, and Greyback responded with another amused smirk.

“Am I, Potter?” he asked as he took another step forward. “I could smell it on you as you fled the battle—your sub tendencies. Something that could mature with The Bite.”

Harry wasn't certain when Greyback had gotten so close, and he scrambled back to get out of his reach, but not quickly enough, and he closed a large hand over Harry's wrist, yanking him closer, while the other hand pressed flat against his abdomen.

Harry hated how dizzy with fright he felt in that moment, but worse that that was a niggling sensation at the back of his mind that positively _preened_ at Greyback's closeness. The wrongness of that alone made Harry feel sick, and something told him that Greyback knew _exactly_ what this touch was doing to him.

“You're _mine_ ,” Greyback continued, pressing his hand more firmly against Harry's stomach, a silent, terrifying promise of what was to become of him. “And you will bear me cubs. I won't let anyone else touch you.”

“I'm not _yours_ ,” Harry growled softly, pulling against Greyback's hold feebly, but it was like being caught in a steel trap, and it only made Greyback clamp down harder on him. “I'll _never_ be yours. I'm not some...some... _brood mare._ You'll never touch me.”

“We'll see about that,” Greyback replied with a soft chuckle, and pulled on Harry's arm until he was forced to walk at his side, the hand moving to rest at the small of his back, presumably to ensure that he wouldn't run. “Your place is with my pack now, whether you believe it yet or not.”

Harry was beginning to regret waking up at all.

 

~*~

 

Two days after Voldemort's fall, Neville found himself seated at a rectangular table inside the most depressing house he'd ever set eyes on.

Neville was seated between Ron and Hermione, but his gaze was not on his companions, but instead fixed on the other people at the table. The Weasleys had been excused to grieve for their lost son, but Ron had insisted on being present. Perhaps, Neville supposed, Ron was one of those people who needed to do something proactive when experiencing a loss, but he wasn't certain.

He had no idea why the surviving Order members insisted upon using this house as their base of operation, or indeed why they were even there. Voldemort was dead, in part by his own hand (and wasn't that a strange thought?) so why did they still need to act like he was alive and well?

“The latest information we have on Harry is this,” Kingsley Shacklebolt, new Minister for Magic, pronounced as he gazed around the tables at the others—Deladus Diggle, Emmeline Vance, Minerva McGonagall, and a number of other Hogwarts professors, their expressions hardened. In the days since Voldemort fell no one had heard from Harry—not even Ron or Hermione. “All the known Death Eaters have been captured or killed—save one.”

“Fenrir Greyback,” McGonagall filled in, her voice tense. Shacklebolt nodded once to her words.

“With Harry missing, the Ministry appears torn between several beliefs—that Harry deserted us as Voldemort claimed, that he is in league with Greyback, or that Greyback kidnapped him,” he said, and Neville clenched his hand into a pair of fists under the table. “If he is found guilty of treason, even in my new position as Minister, there is only so much I'll be able to do for him. An Azkaban sentence for a charge of treason is twenty-five to fifty years. I could try to reduce it, but with the Ministry in such a state of disarray, I'm afraid there are more important matters to contend with than just finding Harry and discovering what happened that night.”

“Be fair, this _is_ Harry we're talking about,” Ron said, his tone of voice somewhat hollow, and he did not look up as he spoke. “Harry wouldn't leave without a good reason, and while he was never prejudiced against werewolves, he knows what Greyback is. He'd _never_ join him.”

“Be that as it may,” Shacklebolt continued, “whatever the reason, I believe the Order should put finding Harry at the top of our list of priorities. If the Ministry finds him first, it will be a curse first, ask questions later scenario. He'll be locked up—or worse—if we do not locate him.”

“Er,” Neville cleared his throat, and in the process drew the eyes of all the older Order members to him, and he squirmed uncomfortably in his seat. “This is the question nobody really wants to hear, but, er, what if Harry really is a deserter, or if he really _is_ with Greyback? What do we do then?”

“We're playing everything by ear right now, Mr Longbottom,” Shacklebolt replied, his tone of voice kind and patient, where Neville had expected it to be dismissive. “We'll cross that bridge when we come to it. Right now, I think we should just focus on finding Harry.”

“Okay,” Neville replied with a nod. That was something he could live with.

 

~*~

 

Fenrir had quite forgotten just how slow the trek back to his pack's land was when he had a sub in tow.

It had been a good long while since he'd even _had_ a sub to sink his teeth into, and young Potter was ripe and ready—he just didn't know it yet. It would have been a lot faster if he could just transform and carry his sub back, but he fled from Fenrir's touch like his skin burned him, hissing and snarling like a damned cat.

Fenrir watched Potter move at his side, his expression set in a scowl, and his eyes focused resolutely forward. He was so tense that Fenrir almost felt as though one strong gust of wind would snap him cleanly in half.

In particular however, Fenrir could not help but _notice_ the boy. The physical differences between a submissive wolf and a dominant one were always easiest to detect in the early stages of one's transformation, and while a dominant like Fenrir would grow taller and become bulkier with muscle—and gained an inch or so below the belt—subs were an entirely different story.

Male subs, Fenrir knew, had it rough. Though growing new organs was the only significant change that Potter would experience, Fenrir knew from the male subs in his own pack that it was quite a painful experience, and it resulted in a great deal of muscle cramping in their lower back and abdomen. Usually, there were a number of pack members or a mate around to aid the new sub through these stages, but right now Potter only had Fenrir, someone who he loathed, and Fenrir had a feeling that his touch—even his helpful touch—would be most unwelcome.

Despite how infuriating it was, Fenrir knew that Potter would fit quite nicely in his arms and bed, when he came to accept his place in it. One with such strength only belonged alongside an alpha wolf, and Fenrir wasn't about to give him up to anyone else.

 

“Would you _stop_ that?”

Potter's agitated voice drew Fenrir from his musings, and when he glanced down at the new sub, he saw that Potter was glaring at him brazenly.

“Stop what, exactly?” he asked, arching a brow as Potter glared at him again, and crossed his arms.

“ _Staring_ at me like that! I'm not some bitch that you'll get into your bed,” Potter snarled angrily, his anger, discomfort, and fear coming off him in waves. “I'm not into that, all right? So you just...find someone else to lust after, 'cause I'll _never_ willingly touch you.”

“Is that so?” Fenrir asked with an arched brow, and closed the distance between them in one stride.

Before Potter could squirm out of arm's reach, Fenrir took hold of him and pressed him into his chest, rumbling in pleasure at how well the young man fit there—like he was _made_ to be there. His hand dropped to the small of Potter's back and he found the taut muscles there and rubbed them gently. He knew that they had to be hurting the young man, but so too did he knew that that he'd never admit to it. From what Fenrir knew of him, he'd endured all manner of accidents and injuries at that infernal wizard school of his, and likely a little muscle cramping would be nothing to him.

Yet another reason why Harry Potter was his perfect mate.

Under his touch, Fenrir could feel the little sub begin to relax, though he knew it was a natural, instinctual reaction to the presence of a dominant that they knew that they could trust—on a subconscious level, at least. He felt Potter shiver, as though he suddenly realized what was happening, and he wrenched himself out of the larger werewolf's hold. Fenrir let him go; there was nothing to be gained by trying to restrain him. He appeared caught between anger and horror, while his voice seemed to have died in his throat. Resisting the urge to laugh at the young man's reaction, he turned away from him, and they returned to their slow trek south.

 

~*~

 

Harry walked stiffly at Greyback's side, his mind warring between the burning desire to run, and the absolute misery in knowing that Greyback would likely catch up to him within minutes. Harry was also stuck wondering just how accurate what Greyback told him was. Would he _really_ be carted off by these so-called _rogues—_ Harry assumed rogue werewolves without a pack, for what else could they be—or arrested by his friends for what he had done?

Harry rolled his stiff shoulders while he kept his face blank and expressionless. His lower back was aching in a way he'd never felt before, and he was incredibly unnerved by how Greyback seemed to know exactly what to do to alleviate some of the pain. The few seconds of massaging his back had felt wonderful— _too_ wonderful, in fact. Harry shivered a little at the memory of it, and that temptation that thrummed just under his skin, pushing him to ask for Greyback's help made it even worse.

As the sun got lower on the horizon, Harry's stomach made a very audible growl. As he thought on it, he couldn't actually remember the last time he'd eaten, and at the same moment Greyback's head swivelled towards him, his eyes narrowing.

“When did you last eat?” he asked, and Harry shrugged a little. “That's not an answer. _When_ did you last eat?”

“I dunno,” Harry answered honestly. “Before I got to Hogwarts so...two days ago, maybe three?”

“And why didn't you say anything?” Greyback growled, and again Harry shrugged.

“Been a bit preoccupied with watching friends die, running away when I should have been fighting, then getting bitten and then kidnapped by you. Haven't had time to slow down and think about my stomach,” Harry growled back, and Greyback glared at him again.

Before Harry could say another word, Greyback grabbed him by the shoulder, dragged him to a boulder some ten feet away, and forced him down onto it. Confused and a little alarmed, Harry watched as Greyback whipped his cock out and proceeded to urinate in a ten-foot circle around him in several different spots. Before Harry had time to fathom _why_ Greyback needed to piss like that, he watched as the werewolf tucked himself away and approached Harry again.

“ _Stay_ ,” Greyback growled at him, “I'm not fucking around, Potter. I have no idea what might be in this forest, but if there are werewolves around, my scent markers will keep them away. If you step out of this circle, you have no one to blame but yourself if you get carted off to become some pack's fuck toy. Am I clear?”

“Clear,” Harry muttered, glaring up at him. Greyback growled one last time, then turned and stalked off into the woods.

_If he thinks I'm just going to sit around for him to resume dragging me off to God knows where, he's crazier than Bellatrix,_ Harry thought as he watched him go. When he could no longer hear Greyback's footsteps, he jumped up and bolted in the opposite direction.

When he'd run about a quarter-mile, Harry stumbled to a stop behind a tree, panting hard. His mouth was sticky with dehydration, his head was beginning to ache, and it took several minutes for Harry to catch his breath.

Straightening up, Harry moved to Disapparate, intending to go as far as he could without the risk of splinching himself, but at the same moment a strong hand seemed to come out of nowhere and coiled around his forearm, stopping his escape short.

“Well, well, well,” cooed a cockney voice, “what have we here?”

Harry's gaze whipped to the man that held him, and struggled to not quail at the sight of him. Tall and lean, with long black hair halfway down his back, a hooked nose, and a jagged scar on his cheek in the shape of an X. In many ways, he reminded Harry of Snape—save that this man actually scared him.

“I...er...” Harry swallowed nervously, and felt as though his veins had flooded with ice as he realized that the man wasn't alone.

“Poor little lamb lost his way,” said one of the others, thickset and heavily muscled, with a shiny bald head.

“And stumbled right into our territory, din'cha, love?” The man who held him leered, closing the distance between them. Harry jumped back, breathing hard as he tried to pull his arm from the man's hold. Like with Greyback, he was horrified to find that he was too physically weak to do so.

“Don't call me that,” Harry growled with bravery he did not feel, “ let me go.”

“Can't be doing that, I'm afraid,” he replied with a grin, “Y'see, you've got the smell of an alpha we know _very_ well all over you. You're _covered_ in him, my sweet. Greyback's not used to things not going his way, and it will be such a delight to defile you before Greyback has the chance to.”

Harry felt himself flush with shame at the pet names. Around him, the other werewolves laughed nastily, while as covertly as he could, Harry slid his free hand into his pocket, and closed it around the handle of Malfoy's wand.

“Name's Theron,” the werewolf purred, “but you can scream whatever name you like when I take you.”

Theron leant in, his other hand coiling around the waistband of Harry's jeans, and Harry reacted at once. He whipped out the wand and muttered a quick stinging hex, and at such close range, it hit the desired target, landing upon the werewolf, squarely in the eye.

Howling in pain, Theron clapped a hand to his face as he shoved Harry away. Harry staggered for a moment before he found his footing and ran, but only managed a handful of steps before one of the other werewolves tripped him, and he fell hard in the dirt. One heavy boot pinned him down, while Harry watched helplessly as one of Theron's cronies snatched the wand from his hand, and snapped it like kindling.

Harry felt what little hope he had left leave him as the boot lifted from his back, and he hissed in pain as one of the werewolves dragged him to his feet by his hair. Theron's infuriated face was inches from Harry's, and he gasped, the air rushing from his lungs as the apparent alpha wolf slammed him into a tree, his head swinging back and knocking against the wood, hard enough that he saw stars.

“Now, that wasn't very nice,” he growled lowly, the eye that Harry had hit red, swollen, and deeply bloodshot. “You just love to make life for yourself difficult, don't you, pet?”

 

~*~

 

Fenrir ground his teeth as he draped the dead pheasant over his shoulder and made his way back to where he'd left the boy.

He was unused to a sub so completely rejecting him, and though he knew Potter had more cause than most wizards to hate him—he'd mangled that ginger on their side, he'd turned Lupin as a child, who had apparently been some kind of mentor to Potter, and he worked for a man who had wanted him dead. Even so, by now his new werewolf instincts should have eclipsed his petty human morals, but he had yet to see Potter even show the faintest interest in him, and he had no idea how to move the process along.

“Probably a worry for another day,” Fenrir muttered to himself as he rounded a thick oak and came back to the spot, only to curse loudly when his eyes fell upon it.

“Oh fucking _hell_ ,” he growled as he stared at his temporary territory, only to find it devoid of any sign of life. “Rule fucking one, don't wander off. There could be anything in this fucking forest,” he grumbled angrily as he threw the pheasant inside his scent markers, and changed smoothly into his wolf form.

Nose to the ground, he followed the scent of his sub deeper into the woods, but quickly he realized he didn't need to as he heard a number of jeering voices ahead of him. Lip curling in a snarl, he broke into a run.

 

Fenrir cleared the distance in a matter of minutes, moving downwind of the raised voices, and his hackles rose when he recognized them immediately.

_A pack of rogues,_ he thought, _perfect._

Fenrir's claws dug into the soil as he watched the would-be alpha manhandle his sub. Despite his rage at the boy for taking off, he had to admire his spirit. Being held a foot off the ground by the throat was likely far from comfortable, but aside from the occasional grimace, not a single cry of pain escaped him.

_My sub will be strong,_ Fenrir thought proudly, _though, of course, I already knew that._

Without another moment's hesitation, Fenrir changed back as he picked out the omega of the feeble pack. None of them could really be considered weak by any means, but neither were they strong—not compared to Fenrir, at least.

As silently as he could, Fenrir stepped up behind the omega, and snapped his neck with a very satisfying _crack_.

The body crumpled to his feet, and all eyes turned to him.

“Fenrir, so nice of you to join us,” Theron said smoothly, still holding Fenrir's struggling sub by the throat. “I was just teaching this little one a thing or two about respecting his superiors.” As Theron turned more fully to him, it took Fenrir a great amount of strength to keep from smirking at the man's very red and likely painful-looking eye. It was fresh enough that there was only one likely suspect to whom had caused the injury, and he puffed out his chest a little with pride at his sub's brazenness.

“Theron,” he replied in the same near-amiable tone, passing through the throng brigands and towards their supposed alpha, all but daring them to attack him. “I would have thought by now that you had learnt to keep your hands off what is _mine_ , or do I need to teach you that lesson...again?”

Theron's lip curled in a snarl as he dropped Potter, who landed in a heap at Fenrir's feet, a hand coming to his throat, and he massaged the reddened flesh while he coughed several times. For the moment, his sub appeared too shaken to move, but Fenrir was reassured that he was all right, and did not immediately go to him while he continued to lock eyes with Theron.

“I don't see your name on him,” Theron replied silkily, “what makes you think he's yours?”

“You're not looking hard enough,” Fenrir said, “I have laid claim, he's mine. If you would be so kind as to return him, I won't feel the need to kill off more of your people—or you, for that matter.”

Fenrir smirked, knowing he had won. Though no blows had been exchanged, all the wolves present hadn't the nerve to go against him face-to-face. His strength was still unmatched, and everyone knew it.

Especially Theron, given that it had been Fenrir himself who had ejected him from the role of alpha of his own pack—something the fallen leader wasn't likely to forget any time soon.

Fenrir waited silently, his arms crossed, then with a frustrated growl Theron grabbed Potter by the upper arm and shoved him towards Fenrir. Without missing a beat, he hefted the protesting sub over his shoulder, ignoring his feeble, rasping curses and incessant squirming. He wasn't going anywhere—not this time.

“This isn't over, Greyback,” Theron growled.

“It looks over to me, Theron,” Fenrir replied as he turned his back on him. “The next time you try to usurp me, at least _try_ and make it an actual challenge, would you?”

Ignoring the angry expletives that met his words, he took a step away from the rogues, and out of the corner of his eye he saw Theron lurch forward, as though he intended to attack him.

Fenrir turned his head, still holding Harry over his shoulder securely with one arm while he stared at Theron. He puffed his chest out at the rogue, he squared his shoulders, and stared back into the corsair's eyes, only to smirk when his dominance display was met with Theron backing down more quickly than he could have predicted.

The rogue was still growling when Fenrir once more turned his back on him, but this time he did not bother to reassert his claim to such a weakling. Instead, he strode back through the towering trees with his sub still over his shoulder.

 


	3. Family

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Hi guys, thanks again for following this story, I'm really glad you're enjoying it ^.^ Next update will be July 1st.

Chapter Three – Family

“What part of, _'stay here,_ _I'm not fucking around,' wasn't_ clear?” Greyback demanded angrily while he tossed Harry like a sack of potatoes into the circle he'd marked earlier, and he grunted as all the air was forced from his lungs, but that didn't stop him from shooting the werewolf with a nasty glare.

Harry sat up slowly, massaging his throat where the brute—the _other_ brute, that is—had held him, but he didn't speak right away as he continued to glare up at Greyback, who went on with his diatribe uninterrupted. “You're new to this, and you don't quite understand how things _work_ yet. But you are more or less a homing beacon for any dominant werewolf within tracking distance. They'll know by scent that you can carry young, and not all werewolves will live by the Code— _especially_ not rogues like that lot.”

“Code?” Harry rasped, and at the sound of his voice Harry was almost certain he saw a flash of concern cross the man's features, but a second later it was gone. “What Code?”

“Werewolf Code,” Greyback replied with the same frustrated edge to his tone. “ _Above all else, the protection of the submissive wolf is imperative, for they hold the key to our race_ ,” he recited, then glared at Harry again. “I have yet to meet a rogue pack who follows the Code, and had I not come to get you, you would either be dead or raped repeatedly, even out of season. If that is what you want, Potter, then you are more of a masochist than I originally took you for.”

Harry gritted his teeth, but didn't answer. Werewolf _Code_? Was he making that up, just to make himself look good?

Harry glanced away from Greyback, his mind still trying to catch up with everything that had happened in such a short span of time. His view of the werewolf had been utterly shattered in less than two days, but he wasn't sure what he was seeing. A _good_ man? An honest man?

Somehow, Harry seriously doubted it.

Greyback glared at him, lip curled back in a snarl, then he shook his head, turned to the pheasant carcass on the forest floor, and without another word he sat down next to Harry before he began to pluck it clean.

 

Harry watched him in silence, his knees drawn up to his chest, while his mind was still stuck on numb shock that _Greyback,_ of all people, had actually come to his rescue.

_Not for any selfless reasons, though,_ Harry reminded himself, and he winced as his mind was drawn away from the recent past, and back to his tumultuous and unpredictable future.

Up until recently, if Harry was being honest with himself, he didn't think he would have much of one. Now, he was facing a lifetime apparently bound to Greyback—unless he found a way out of it. The idea made him shudder, and worse still was Greyback's snarled promise to him that was still burned into his mind—

_You're mine, and you will bear me cubs. I won't let anyone else touch you._

 

Harry was drawn abruptly from his morose thoughts by the scent of cooking meat, and he refocused his gaze upon Greyback to see that he'd built a fire, and the dismembered bird was roasting in hunks over the flame, threaded onto narrow sticks. It smelt amazing, and Harry felt himself go red as his stomach gave another audible rumble.

Twenty minutes later, Greyback handed Harry one of the skewers, and Harry mumbled his thanks. He ate in silence, polishing off three of the skewers before he began to feel even remotely full. Greyback had taken to eating the organs almost raw, and Harry looked away to keep his stomach from roiling at the sight.

Suddenly, a bloody hand gripped Harry's shoulder and made him jump, and he looked up with wide eyes, uncertain of when Greyback had gotten so close. He tried to worm out of the hold, but Greyback merely gripped his shoulder more tightly in warning.

“The next time you're hungry, speak up,” he rumbled, his voice laced with irritation. “Whether you like it or not, I am responsible for you; you're _my_ sub, and it's my job to provide for you. Is that clear?”

Harry frowned up at him, feeling like a child—a kidnapped child, no less—but he had no idea what to say after his harrowing experience with the rogue wolves. Tired, scared, and feeling terribly vulnerable, he nodded meekly, not meeting Greyback's eye.

“Good, 'cause it's another day's journey to my territory, and I don't fancy having to carry you if you faint from hunger.”

 

~*~

 

Neville woke on the fourth day following the Battle of Hogwarts, and it felt no more real to him than it had any day that preceded it. His dreams were filled with blood, and death, and horror, and the fact that he knew that this was but a taste of what Harry had gone through over the course of his life was incredibly humbling. More than once, he wondered how Harry had managed it without cracking up.

He dressed, breakfasted with his Gran, then Apparated to Grimmauld Place in the early afternoon for yet another Finding Harry meeting.

“Hey, Hermione,” Neville said as she let him in. She offered him a small, welcoming smile, and they headed farther into the house while he voiced his daily question. “What's the news?”

“Nothing thrilling,” she replied, leading him from the front hall to the dining room, where a number of maps, charts and complex calculations lay strewn across the table. “We've come up with no way to track Harry successfully, and the Ministry is still a _mess_. You should see Kingsley when he gets here, he's just an absolute wreck. I mean, more than half the Ministry staff were arrested on various counts of crimes against muggleborns and half-bloods, and he called in some sort of magical wrecking crew to get rid of that awful Magic is Might obelisk...thing.” She rubbed her eyes, then continued as she sat down heavily in one of the available chairs around the table. “Ron and I are trying to figure out a way to at least _contact_ Harry, and we first thought Ron's Deluminator that Dumbledore left him might work, but we just can't get it to work like it did before...” Hermione trailed off, shuffling through the papers as she talked, and Neville blinked, puzzled at her words. She had told him _some_ of what they'd done over the last year, but a lot of it was still too raw, still too close to the surface for them to discuss. To Neville's blank look however, she seemed to realize that he had no clue what she was on about, and elaborated.

“Oh, um, well, at one point, Ron kind of...left us,” she explained, and winced at the memory. “He couldn't get back because of the secretive charms we had around our tent, and when he was at Shell Cottage during Christmas he told us that he heard our voices coming out of the Deluminator. He clicked it, and a ball of light went out and sort of...went into him. He didn't explain that bit very well...anyway, when he Disapparated, he found us pretty much straightaway, but we didn't know it was him 'til a little while later, because he couldn't get to our tent with our warding up, that was, until he crossed paths with Harry.”

“I hate to say this,” Neville said, “but...d'you think that's because Ron _wanted_ to find you, and you two _wanted_ him to come back? Maybe Harry doesn't want to be found.”

Immediately, Hermione's eyes welled with tears, and she buried her face in her hands. Neville cursed under his breath.

“Shit, Hermione, I'm sorry, I didn't mean—” Neville began, but she straightened up and shook her head, though her eyes were still very teary.

“No,” she said with a sniffle, “you—you have a point. But if Harry doesn't want to be found, that sort of points to the _he abandoned us_ theory.”

“But...” Neville paused, looking up as Ron joined them, and Hermione folded herself into his arms for a long moment before she managed to compose herself, and he pressed on. “I mean, why would Harry abandon us, run off like that? Does anyone remember when they last saw him?”

“I do,” Hermione said, her voice tight and her eyes glassy again. “When—when Voldemort killed Professor Snape. He—he—his memories came out of him as he was d-dying, and Harry took them. Whatever P-Professor Snape showed him must have...” she trailed off, her voice catching, and Ron handed her a handkerchief, which she used to mop her eyes.

“It had to be something pretty awful to make someone like _Harry_ scarper,” Neville mumbled, cradling his chin in his hand as he stared down at the tabletop.

“We don't know that for sure,” Ron said at once, his voice hard and forced; both he and Hermione could hear the uncertainty in his tone. “Maybe—maybe something happened. Greyback's missing too, right? He probably kidnapped Harry.”

“Maybe we should go back to Professor Snape's memories,” Hermione said thoughtfully, her voice still a little hoarse, but much calmer than it had been moments before. “Professor McGonagall probably has access to them, we could ask her what she saw.”

Neville grimaced a little, but nodded. The _last_ thing he wanted to do was to go poking around in Snape's memories, but he knew that they had to, if nothing else to figure out just what happened that night.

Luckily, when the other Order members showed up for the meeting, it turned out that they wouldn't have to.

“I have been trying to put together what may have happened that night,” McGonagall began, glancing from her three ex-students to the other order members in attendance. “I believe that I may have the solution to the riddle. Unfortunately, it may raise more questions than it answers.

“I found Albus's old Pensieve on the headmaster's desk yesterday when I went to check on the school, and it was filled with someone's memories—the memories of Professor Snape.” McGonagall paused as several people began to mutter under their breath to one another, but a single withering glance from her immediately silenced them. “It would seem that Professor Snape was not, in fact, a betrayer, but working for Albus in secret all this time, and in doing so, protected Mr Potter. Unfortunately, it would seem that Harry's destiny was to not survive the war.”

Dead silence followed her words.

“What do you mean, Professor?” Hermione asked softly, her voice barely above a frightened whisper as she spoke.

“I mean, Miss Granger, is that on the night that Harry's parents died, Lily's protection rebounded Voldemort's curse, and in doing so blasted a piece of his soul from the whole and attached itself to the only other living thing in the room, creating a Horcrux,” McGonagall said, giving Hermione a significant glance.

“But—but Voldemort is dead. Does that mean...Harry's dead too?” Ron asked, his skin having gone very white.

“As to that, Mr Weasley, I do not know,” McGonagall admitted, her lips twisted into a momentary grimace before she added, “my knowledge of Horcruxes and their properties is—unfortunately—limited, but given what we do know...it is very possible. If he is not, we must prepare ourselves to assume that Voldemort is not as dead as we may hope him to be.”

“Do you think that's why Harry left?” Hermione asked in a very small voice, “to k-kill himself?”

“He may have also run out of fear,” Kingsley added in, “that's a hell of a weight to place on the shoulders of a seventeen-year-old kid.”

There was a long pause, and swallowing nervously, Neville voiced his own question.

“So, um, are we hoping to find Harry alive or dead?” he asked, and all the heads swivelled to look at him. He was a far cry from the timid boy he'd been two years ago, but to be seated with the Order of the Phoenix and viewed as an equal still took some getting used to.

“Alive, it suggests that Voldemort has one last link holding him to this world,” McGonagall said, “dead, Voldemort is truly gone.”

“And so is Harry,” Hermione said in a soft voice, her eyes glazing over with tears again.

“Before we jump to any conclusions, Miss Granger, we need to find Harry first,” Kingsley said patiently. “He is of age, so The Trace is no use to us, which is a small mercy, given that the Ministry could have used it to track him if he tried to do any magic. Without any leads however, it may be impossible to—” Kingsley's words were cut off suddenly when Ron slapped the table, making everyone jump.

“Pig,” he said, his eyes wide.

“Come again?” Neville asked.

“Pig, my owl. Owls have their own brand of magic, right? We could write a letter to Harry, asking him where he is!” Ron said excitedly.

“Wait,” Hermione said, frowning at her boyfriend, “if Harry _did_ run away, he's not likely to answer a letter from us, is he?”

“Have any better ideas?” Ron countered, his voice edged with hurt. Hermione smiled.

“As a matter of fact, I do,” she said, and pulled out a glossy magazine that Neville had never heard of called _National Geographic_. It looked wrong somehow, but then he realized that it must be a muggle magazine, because the pictures weren't moving. Hermione flipped to an earmarked page filled with narrow columns of neat writing, and photographs of a number of different species of bird and bat.

“This,” she said, pointing to a picture of a falcon with a strange orange thing on its ankle, “is a tracking device muggle scientists use to track migratory patterns of different kinds of animals. They use them on everything from herds of reindeer to bats to birds...I thought, well, assuming Harry isn't in some place that is too heavily magical, we could use one of these devices. Strap it to Pig's leg and then follow the signal.”

“Using a muggle method to find Harry Potter,” Ron said with a grin and a barking laugh, “my dad is gonna _love_ this.”

 

~*~

 

Fenrir made a point of stopping periodically to feed Potter as they walked, since he didn't feel obliged to let his alpha actually _know_ when he was hungry. As they moved, the boy trailed behind him while he radiated waves of misery and discontent. The silence and never ending misery was grating on Fenrir—not that he was a big conversationalist, but something other than this constant mistrust would have made for a nice change.

He could tell that his sub was still in pain, given that his body was still changing to adapt to his new werewolf form, and Fenrir noted how Potter would grimace every so often as he rubbed at his back or abdomen, but he never voiced a word of complaint.

“Potter,” he growled after two hours of walking in silence. Potter froze as he looked up at him, his expression seemingly perched between fear and a brazen sort of courage. “Are you in pain?”

“M'fine,” he replied stiffly, but even as he did so, his hand strayed to his lower back and rubbed at the muscles there.

“No, you're not,” he growled, and Potter glared obstinately at him, all but daring Fenrir to come any closer. With a frustrated growl, he resisted the urge to drag his sub closer, and they resumed their walking in tense, awkward silence.

As the sun began to hang low on the horizon, Fenrir figured it was as good a time as any for them to stop for the evening.

Fenrir picked out a mossy cave not far from where they stood, and inside he found that they would have protection from the wind, but the space was clearly more snug that Potter would have liked, if the way he was pressing himself into the cave wall was any indication.

Grumbling to himself as he did his best to ignore this silly behaviour, Fenrir pressed his palm into the centre of the cave floor, and a woodless, smokeless fire materialized before them. He smirked a little when Potter stared in open-mouthed shock at this blatant use of werewolf magic; he could not blame him for staring—precious few wizards were ever permitted to see such a thing, and as a newborn werewolf, he now had the privilege to do so.

“Come here,” Fenrir commanded, and Potter shot him a nasty glare.

“No way,” he replied at once, and Fenrir ground his teeth in frustration. With that simple phrase he felt his patience snap, and he reached across the small space to close his hand around the beaten leather of Potter's belt. He dragged his sub to him, ignoring his shouts of alarm and the way he dug his nails into the dirt, trying to slow his movement, and only stopped when he'd positioned his sub on top of his thighs, Fenrir's front to Potter's back.

Keeping one hand clamped firmly around the belt, Fenrir's other trailed down the boy's spine and to the tense, aching muscles of his lower back. He ignored the way Potter tried to jerk repeatedly from his hold, squirming and shouting obscenities as he did so, while Fenrir began to massage the knots in his sub's back. Fenrir heard the sub's breath escape him as little more than frightened pants, and even as he massaged away the ache, the boy was tense with fright—though he'd likely never admit that Fenrir was _helping_ to ease the pain.

“Contrary to what you have been led to believe,” Fenrir purred in his ear, making Potter shiver, “I am not a mindless beast. I take what is rightfully mine, but I am not one for force. I want someone in my bed who _wants_ to be there. And you _will_ want me, Potter, whether you believe it or not.” His arm that was not still linked to Potter's belt snaked around the boy's middle, pulling him flush against his chest, but this time, Potter did not immediately try to get away. His body slumped, but it was more like he'd momentarily given up than accepted his situation.

The scent of the sub in his arms, a young, healthy sub who was _so_ ready, even though he didn't know it yet, was playing havoc with Fenrir's senses. He shifted ever so slightly so that Potter wouldn't feel Fenrir's growing erection pressing into him—something told him that he wasn't quite ready for _that_ yet. Potter was still panting a little as Fenrir held onto him, warmed by the gentle fire light, though if it was from exhaustion or fear, Fenrir could not tell. Potter seemed to be in a constant state of high alert—he was never calm, and this confused his scent and burned the dominant wolf's nose like an acrid, rotting animal carcass might.

“Why me?” Potter asked hollowly after a few moments of silence. He squirmed experimentally, but Fenrir did not let him go. “Was this some contingency plan of Voldemort's? If I fail, ruin Harry Potter's life by turning him into some...some... _bitch_?”

Fenrir trailed the tip of his tongue along the shell of Potter's ear. He gasped and shivered, and Fenrir could smell that it was not completely out of fear. He nipped at the supple flesh once before he answered.

“Hardly,” he said, and snorted derisively. “As if your _Dark Lord_ would ever pass you off to anyone, he was too fixated upon killing you.” He paused, but Potter did not respond to this statement with fear—did he truly not fear Voldemort? Fenrir brushed the curiosity aside, and continued.

“You smelt of sub potential; I smelt it that night when Dumbledore fell, though at the time I did not know that it was you. When you fled—” Potter tensed at the word, but Fenrir continued as though he hadn't noticed, “—I smelt it again, and I vowed this time to not lose you. Being mine is not the horrible life you are making it out to be,” his voice dropped a little as he released Potter's belt, but continued to hold tightly to him with one arm, while his free hand trailed down his front before it rested upon the top of one of his thighs, and he gave it a small squeeze. “You will want for nothing. You will have food, shelter—a family. Something, I have heard, you never had.”

Potter shivered in his arms, and Fenrir removed his hand from his leg. He wanted the boy, but he'd done his fair share of rape under Voldemort's employ, and beyond it making his skin crawl and his conscience heavy, he got little joy from a partner who did not want him. When he finally took Potter to bed, it would be _his_ choice. Even so, he did not feel inclined to release the sub. He _fit_ in his arms, and he knew that the massage would have alleviated some of the muscle pain—though he doubted Potter would ever admit to it.

“I—but—” Potter began to protest, but his voice had dropped to a soft murmur before it trailed off. Fenrir shifted his position so that Potter slid down from his lap to sit between his legs, and this time, there was no missing the hardness of his cock that pressed into the small of the sub's back. He gritted his teeth to keep from reacting to the minute friction as Potter immediately began to fidget. Did his sub even _realize_ what he was doing?

“Even if I had not claimed you,” Fenrir continued, his voice muttering the words into Potter's ear, his breath brushing against the sub's skin and eliciting another charming shiver from him, “your place would still no longer be among your human friends. Your place is with us.”

“You turned R-Remus and he never left his family,” Potter responded shakily, easing back ever so slightly against Fenrir. He wasn't certain if his sub realized that he was doing it, but it was pleasing nevertheless. The mention of another werewolf's name upon his claimed sub's lips was another story, and when a soft growl escaped from him unbidden, he felt Potter tense.

“That doddering old fool— _Dumbledore—_ got in the way,” Fenrir growled softly, finding no reason to lie to Potter about this—it was best that he know that the so-called guiding light of the side of all that was supposedly good and pure was an interfering old fool with no concept of pack law. “He took a great risk in keeping that boy from me. Had he lost control and killed his family, he would have blood on his hands—I do not doubt that the Wizard Ministry would have executed him without a second thought, had it come to that. I was looking for one with dominant potential, and Remus was the perfect candidate, though he had no knowledge of it at his age. His father rebuffed me, and I took revenge by biting him more viciously than I normally would have. His strength reared its head when that little boy survived his injuries.” Fenrir tightened his hold on his sub, but he was too wrapped up in the tale and did not respond to Potter's tiny gasp. “Dumbledore kept one of my kin from me, there is no redeeming such a heinous act.”

Fenrir watched Potter's head bow a little as he finished his tale. He was aware that he had been rather close with the old man, but he would not apologize for his harsh words, especially not when he meant every single one of them. He was grateful that Dumbledore was dead and gone, and would not keep his prospective mate from him as well.

“Your place is with us,” Fenrir repeated as he brushed his hand over Potter's bare forearm, and the contact making him twitch with negation, but again, Fenrir ignored it. “You'll see.”

 

~*~

 

Harry fell asleep that night nestled in Greyback's arms, held close like a favoured toy. Though he was loath to admit it, he rather enjoyed the sensation—the feeling of safety that Greyback's great bulk provided him, was like a shield from all the dangers of the outside world—so much so that despite Harry's knowledge that he needed to escape this, he couldn't completely bring himself to do so. After everything he'd been through, he was so tired—it felt as though he could sleep for a hundred years, and not feel fully rested. Instead of trying to slip from the werewolf's grasp and escape, he nestled himself into the older man's arms and fell asleep.

Sometime in the night Harry had rolled over unknowingly, and pressed his cheek to Greyback's chest. The heat of his flesh and the steady, rhythmic beating of his heart lulled him further into sleep, and Harry could not remember the last time he felt so safe, and so protected.

 

And he _hated_ himself for it.

_This is the man who had turned Remus and mauled Bill,_ Harry reminded himself near-constantly, but it seemed as though no matter what excuses he came up with, he seemed destined to...he shivered as it came to mind... _bear his children_.

Harry always knew he'd father children one day, but he never expected it to be quite like this.

He clenched his eyes shut, and tried to get some sleep.

 

Harry lay there as the slow chirping of the first morning birds began to fill the air, pretending to sleep and trying to not react when he felt Greyback brush his rough fingers across his cheek before he touched his abdomen and lower back to check for knots of muscle. Harry did his best to appear as though he was still sleeping when suddenly he felt a warm, wet tongue brush against the hollow of his throat.

He tried to remain still, but the intimate contact had surprised him, and he twitched slightly. Greyback chuckled, and Harry felt that infernal hand brush through his hair once before he let Harry go, and stood up to leave the cave.

Harry listened to Greyback set up additional scent markers before he trudged off into the wood silently. Only when Harry was certain that Greyback was gone did he open his eyes, roll on his back, and stare up at the low ceiling of the cave. His hand moved to touch the damp spot on his throat, and he shivered a little at the memory of it. He felt warm, _too_ warm from such a small touch, but he knew without the shadow of a doubt that if he pulled one off now, the werewolf would _definitely_ know.

Instead, he lay there thinking of the most disgusting things he could think of in an effort to wilt the budding erection.

_Hermione and Ron having sex...Molly and Arthur having sex...McGonagall naked...eugh..._

The last one made Harry shudder; it was like seeing his grandmother naked—if he had one, that is. It was enough to dampen his arousal however, and he finally got up to relieve himself, but was careful to avoid the spots Greyback had used, as he did not know a lot about werewolf culture, and he did not want to dampen the man's scent or claim or something, and make things worse for himself.

_I need to figure out another way to get out of this mess,_ Harry thought as he settled back down by the fire, but he wasn't keen to run off just yet, if he would only get caught by some rogues again, especially now that he did not have any means of defending himself. His gut twisted with guilt as he sat there, his mind blank of ideas for how to escape and not run into _more_ trouble. At the same time, he knew that he _needed_ to get back to Ron and Hermione and explain to them what had happened, but _could_ he, after running away like that? He didn't know.

With a morose sigh, Harry drew his knees up to his chest while his thoughts turned to what Greyback had said the night before.

“ _You will want for nothing. You will have food, shelter—a family. Something, I have heard, you never had._ ”

Harry hated that he found some appeal in that reassurance, even if it came at the hands of his kidnapper. The wizarding world would never leave him alone if he went back, regardless if he was dead, or alive, or somewhere in between.

In contrast, Greyback seemed to want nothing from him but to create a family. A shiver ran through him; the prospect was still somewhat terrifying, but definitely not as terrifying as it should have been. He felt relatively assured that Greyback had no plans to serve him up to some mad Lord like a pig for slaughter, at least.

Harry groaned as he buried his face in his hands, but like his swirling, confused thoughts, the action did not help him come to any sort of conclusion.

 

Greyback returned to the cave before Harry had managed to come up with a new escape plan, not passing Harry even a second glance as he dropped the doe on the opposite side of the fire, and Harry turned away with a grimace as the werewolf drew a knife and began to gut the animal in silence.

Roughly an hour later, the animal had been fully dismembered, and was now cooking over the fire. Once more Greyback kept the organs for himself, and he sat next to Harry while they waited for the meat to cook. His close proximity both alarmed and oddly comforted Harry all at once, and a feeling as though nothing could possibly harm him washed over him as they sat there. He had no idea what to say, his thoughts still a whirlwind of conflicted emotions, but unwilling to show the werewolf his fear, he refused to even so much as inch away from him, and instead sat stock-still at Greyback's side.

Greyback handed Harry a chunk of the cooked meat, and he accepted it as a thought occurred to him that really he should have asked days ago. In all the chaos since his flight however, it had completely slipped his mind until now.

“When you bit me...it was outside the full moon and when you turned back to your human form, you were still wearing clothes,” Harry began, picking idly at the food in his hands. “It was like...an Animagus transformation. How can you do that?”

“I am one of the few who can,” Greyback replied, his low rumble of a voice laced with pride as he spoke. “Animagi, as I assume you know, is a willing transformation from human to animal, something the wizard and their magic accepts wholeheartedly. A werewolf transformation is inevitable—painful, agonizing, and many do not welcome it.

“I was a born werewolf, one of the few still living today,” Greyback paused, as though he meant to say more, but shook his head and pressed forward. “Beyond accepting my wolf, I welcome it. I can call my transformation to me whenever I please, and the extension to my outer garb is a matter of mental acuity. I knew of a handful of turned Legilimens who were able to accomplish this as well.” He lifted a hand to the back of Harry's neck and gave it a small squeeze, a sensation that seemed to shoot straight to Harry's groin, causing him to shiver. “Eat. If we make good time, we should arrive at the territory by sundown.”

The territory.

Harry had almost forgotten that their travel had a destination. Thinking of it now, given that he hadn't asked about it at all, he had no idea what to expect.

_Maybe more big, violent men like Greyback_ , Harry thought as he finally sank his teeth into the meat. He shivered a little, wondering if the territory would be a hollow or a cave like this one, with five or ten men. Another shiver coursed through him, and the hand at the back of Harry's neck squeezed lightly, almost reassuringly.

 

Greyback doused the flames of his magical fire once Harry had finished eating, then escorted him to a nearby brook where he was able to have a drink, and splash cool water on his face. It made for a pitiful substitute to a real bath, but Harry supposed that he would have to get used to it—until he managed to escape, that is. Greyback's presence at his side while he bathed grated on him, and it made him feel like a child incapable of taking care of himself. He understood that the werewolf was probably staying close to make sure he didn't run off again, but this knowledge did little to placate Harry's pride.

Harry dried his face with his T-shirt, the garment riding high as he did so, and as he dropped it, he caught Greyback's gaze watching the way the garment fell with a hungry need. Harry felt himself flush a deep scarlet, but he did not say a word as he fell in step with the larger man and followed him northeast through the thick wood and gradually away from the brook.

They walked in silence for most of the day, Harry having no idea what to say to the man, what to ask, or even how to make small talk with him. He was his enemy, his rescuer, his kidnapper, and his protector all rolled into one, and every attempt that Harry made to pick it apart was quickly making his head ache.

 

Greyback stopped their trek around midday, and Harry watched with amazement as the man rolled his jeans to his knees, stepped barefoot into the nearby stream, and caught two large trout barehanded. This time, Harry couldn't stop his amazement from bubbling to the surface as Greyback tossed the two flailing fish ashore, climbed out, and began to start another one of his smokeless fires.

“How did you _do_ that?” Harry asked, feeling himself go a little red at how breathless he sounded. Greyback smirked as he dipped the fish back into the water to wash off the dirt and leaf litter before he skewered them and propped them around the edges of the fire.

“Many years of practice,” he replied simply, “a werewolf is a creature of the wood; it is our domain. We have innate abilities that work in tandem with the beings that reside within its borders, much like centaurs or unicorns do. We give and take, and hunting comes naturally to us. It will to you too, in time.” Greyback paused, his expression thoughtful as he turned the fish over. “It will not be expected of you of course, given your pack standing, but if you wish to learn I'm certain the hunting parties would be more than happy to teach you.”

“My...pack standing?” Harry asked, uncertain whether or not he really wanted to know.

“As Alpha Bitch, your only job is to make yourself available to me, and to bear my cubs,” Greyback replied simply, “nothing more.”

“You make me sound like some sort of catamite,” Harry muttered sullenly, turning away from his companion to stare into the fire.

“You are most certainly _not_ ,” Greyback growled, his tone so dangerous that Harry jumped a little as he looked back at him with wide eyes. “You are my Alpha Bitch—my _mate_. Not my...harem boy or whatever other ridiculous notion you have in your head. I don't want to hear you calling yourself that, not again.”

He thrust one of the cooked fish at Harry, and he accepted it silently, nodding his thanks and began to eat. He hadn't meant to offend Greyback this time—not _really_ in any case—and he was shocked by how angry he had gotten at Harry's phrasing.

_Greyback is the exact opposite of everything I've ever been told about him_ , Harry thought in quiet amazement. _But I still don't know what that means._

After their small meal, they tossed the bones into the river and doused the fire, and continued on to their destination.

Harry estimated that they'd been walking for about an hour when Greyback began to lead him up a slow incline. Sheet rock replaced much of the grass, and the incline steepened enough to tell Harry that they were climbing a mountain of some kind, which was a far cry from what he had been expecting.

Unused to the physical exertion it took to climb a _mountain_ , Harry soon fell behind Greyback, but he was determined to keep up. No matter what the man said or implied, he _wasn't_ weak. He gripped a stitch in his side, panting slightly as he followed, and he saw Greyback's gait slow as he turned to look at Harry, but something in his expression likely showed Harry's determination to not fall behind, and he did not say a word. Greyback's pace did slow slightly however, which Harry was both grateful for, and was irked by in equal measure.

At the first plateau, Harry suddenly felt something tickle across his skin delicately, like butterfly wings. It took him a moment to realize that this was likely the protective warding around Greyback's home, which distracted Harry enough that it took him several minutes to register what he was seeing before him.

On a sheer outcropping of rock resided over a dozen small wood cabins that faced a cliff, which overlooked the whole forest. In the centre of what could only be described as the village square sat a large bonfire, and like Greyback's small fires, it gave off no smoke. Dozens of people— _werewolves_ , Harry reminded himself—were all over.

Men and women were sitting by the doors of some of the cabins and whittling, others gutting some large beast or another. While others were preparing for dinner or minding the children, in particular helping to corral the children when they got too close to the cliffside.

Something about these men who were watching the children was strange—they were so youthful and almost _pretty_ , in an odd way, they struck Harry as slightly different from the other men that occupied the area, much like the women that were helping see to the kills appeared stronger—not necessarily masculine, but certainly more muscular, at least.

Harry didn't have a chance to ask, either, as the moment they came into view, chaos ensued. However, it was not the sort of _chaos_ that Harry would have expected. Everyone immediately stopped what they were doing and looked up, but it was the children who reacted first.

“Alpha, _Alpha!_ ” they cried excitedly, and in an instant Greyback was surrounded by child werewolves ranging in age from four through twelve, all gibbering excitedly at once, and Harry could barely pick one voice out from the others.

“Alpha, why were you gone so long?”

“Alpha, who's _he_?”

“Alpha, I swallowed a bug!”

“Alpha, Anaïs taught us how to catch fish!”

Harry stared. It was the strangest thing he had ever seen: Fenrir Greyback, most infamous werewolf of the age, surrounded by children and smiling warmly, almost in a fatherly way. While the children seemingly filled him in on all he had missed in an excited rush, the older wolves approached more slowly.

At the front was a pretty young woman in her late twenties or early thirties, slender but strong, with her long silvery blonde hair pulled back into a braid, and her fierce blue eyes watched the children protectively. The other women, all varying in age from teenagers to old women all surrounded her like she was their leader. A few of the pretty young men Harry had noticed earlier also stuck close to her, while the bigger, hardier-looking men hung back, their eyes raking over Harry with a mistrustful look.

Slowly, the children had calmed down and backed off, while the fierce woman stepped forward and embraced him.

“Anaïs,” Greyback greeted, “you look well.”

“And you, Father,” she replied, pulling back and nodding at Harry. Her gaze had softened a little, and Harry did his best to mask his shock at the admission, “I see we have a new pack member.”

“This is Harry,” he said gruffly while he exchanged a significant look with his daughter, which Harry could read all too well. _Yes, that Harry_. His suspicion was confirmed when her eyes immediately flicked up to rake his hairline. “Harry, this is Anaïs, my eldest, and beta of the pack.”

Greyback wrapped an arm around Harry's waist and pulled him against his side in a clear show of claim, but despite Harry's unease at him doing such a thing right in front of his adult child, she did not bat an eyelash at the display. She smiled warmly, and glanced once to her father, who nodded once, giving her permission, and she approached Harry, closing both of her work-weathered hands over one of his.

“Welcome, Harry,” she said formally, “we are pleased to have you.”

“Er...thanks,” he replied awkwardly, “it's...er, nice to meet you.” Harry had no idea what else he could say to her, but her expression did not waver from warm welcome, and she stepped back as soon as the introductions had been completed.

“Gather your brothers and sisters,” Greyback said gruffly to Anaïs, “a welcoming feast is an order for your new Alpha Bitch.”

Anaïs nodded her head once before she swept back to the assembled crowd and pulled seven more adult werewolves aside, and murmured something to them softly. Harry was struck by how similar they all looked, either ginger or blond, green eyes a different shade than his own—a more muted, mossy green rather than his own emerald—or an icy blue closer to Greyback's. Harry did not like the jewel-bright eyes that stared at him, especially those of a slight, red-haired man who appeared to the be the youngest of the group.

He glared at Harry, his eyes pinpricks of cold blue, and while the expression deeply unsettled him, he felt a strange flare in his belly, anger at this clear look of distrust that the man shot at him, and he refused to show his unease. The man's gaze flitted to Greyback, who glared right back at him. Like water being thrown on a fire, the fierce look immediately seemed to dim as the man bowed his head and followed his siblings away.

Harry glanced up to see Greyback's glare following the man, and Harry squirmed uncomfortably. It had not escaped Harry's notice that he was much younger than any of Greyback's grown children, and that made Harry feel distinctly like the wicked stepmother from the fairy stories Aunt Petunia used to read to Dudley.

He shook his head a little, then started slightly as one of Greyback's large hands moved to rest against the small of his back, and he steered Harry away from the assembled crowd.

“I'll introduce you to the pack properly later,” he rumbled, “you need to rest.”

Harry tried to protest; he didn't like the way Greyback so calmly ordered what Harry supposedly _needed_ , but he couldn't deny that his legs were aching from the journey, in particular from their mountainous climb. Despite his exhaustion, he mumbled and tried to explain that he didn't _need_ rest, but it seemed as though just as suddenly they had come to a stop in front of one of the wooden cabins. On the outside, it appeared no different than the others, but Harry could tell that it was the alpha's, from the it was raised slightly above the rest on some sort of naturally-occurring dais. Greyback reached forward and opened the door, and nodded for Harry to go ahead.

Swallowing his nervousness Harry stepped into the cabin, and at once a fire materialized in the grate. It illuminated the small, cozy space, with its hard-packed earthen floor, a raised bed (large enough for two, Harry realized with his heart jumping into his throat) in the far corner, a single wooden shelf stacked with articles of clothing for every season, and two closed doors leading off to different rooms.

The hand returned to the small of Harry's back and he jumped a little, which caused Greyback to growl with annoyance.

“For the love of all that is holy, Potter,” he snapped at him, “what did you think? That I'd throw you down and fuck you the moment I took you home?”

When Harry didn't answer right away, it seemed to be answer enough for the older man. If Harry wasn't mistaken he almost looked hurt by Harry's assumption.

“Rest,” he growled with an almost defeated tone of voice, “I'll come for you when it is time to eat.”

Without another word, the alpha turned his back on his mate, and stalked out of the cabin.

 


	4. Pack Life

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Next update will be July 15th. Enjoy :)

Chapter Four – Pack Life

 

Fenrir stalked from the cabin, growling in frustration at the boy's continuing mistrust of him. He had hoped that by now he wouldn't be as jumpy as a grasshopper in a chicken coop, but clearly that had been too much to ask for.

He stomped down to the main area of the territory, and immediately he was surrounded by the older pack members, all of whom bore varied looks of desperation or fear in their eyes. Fenrir rolled his shoulders slightly, knowing full well what had sparked these expressions, and when one of the elder pack members opened her mouth to speak, his suspicion regarding the source of their anxiety was immediately verified.

“Is it true, Alpha?” Xiang asked, her reedy voice a welcome familiarity after so long away. “The wizard newspapers said so, but it is true...? The dark wizard is dead?”

“It's true,” he replied, glancing to the others that surrounded him. The subs pressed in close, nervous hope in their eyes, while his dominants stood back, listening in, but not crowding him. “I was not present for the end of the final battle, I had business with young Mr Potter, and though I could sense his end, Potter was more important than seeing the final battle through.”

“A teenage lover,” a voice snarled, and Fenrir turned to see his youngest son glaring at him, his arms crossed tightly across his chest. “Hardly fit for the title of alpha bitch.”

The others stepped back as a wave of tension seemed to pass through the territory like an icy wind. Fenrir frowned at the sub, his only male sub child, but like so often in his younger years, Caomh refused to back down.

Fenrir moved forward with slow, predatory steps over to the young man, and Caomh puffed out his chest a little, as though he thought himself like his dominant brothers or sisters. His long red hair had been pulled back from his face, and Fenrir’s own blue eyes glared back at him through narrow slits. It had been a long time indeed since he’d seen Caomh so incensed, almost like he was looking for another fight with his father, not just voicing his disapproval over Fenrir’s choice of a mate.

“I can think of no one more worthy to be at my side than Harry Potter,” Fenrir replied, his voice mostly even, but quivering faintly with anger. “Caomh, do you protest because of—”

“—don't!” Caomh snarled, stepping back from his father while tears sprang to his eyes. “ _Don't_ talk about him, Alpha, not when—when you're _replacing_ Father with that _child_!”

Fenrir let out an infuriated snarl, his weak control over his own rage snapping as he grabbed his son by the throat, not even hesitating when he slammed him into the ground. Caomh let out a gasp of pain, but against his alpha's dominant blood, he had no chance of matching him in physical strength.

“Caomh, listen, and listen well, because I will not repeat myself,” Fenrir growled, “I lost your father to wizards over twenty years ago. I _know_ that that loss was difficult for you. You were very close to him, and you were very young, but I am _not_ replacing Lukas. No one, _no one_ could replace your father. Life goes on, and it is not a sin for me to find a new mate; you are now thirty years old, and there is no reason for you to act like a spoiled brat about this—none at all. Now, do I need to concern myself with Potter’s safety if he is left in your care?”

Caomh glared up at him, and Fenrir tensed his hand at his throat in warning, but his grown child did not seem to notice it.

“No, you needn't worry of his safety with me,” he muttered at last, not looking at Fenrir as he spoke. “I just—I don't like it, Alpha.”

“I don't expect you to like or dislike it,” he replied, releasing Caomh and helping him to his feet. “What I do expect is you to treat him with the respect his pack status demands. Is that clear?”

He nodded, and slouched off to rejoin his siblings. Fenrir watched him go, arms crossed, but Caomh did not look back as he sidled up to older sister, Siobhan, who offered him a tender half-hug, more than he deserved at present, as far as Fenrir was concerned. He turned back to Xiang, and his expression softened a little.

“The so-called Dark Lord is dead,” he repeated, “and I have taken Potter as my Alpha Bitch. He will be a strong sub when he comes to accept his place, and will give new, strong, life to this pack.”

“I do not doubt it Alpha,” Xiang said warmly, “he is a fine choice, regardless what— _others_ may think.”

“I have never cared about the opinion of others, you know that, Xiang,” he said, and she chuckled softly.

“No, you have not,” she agreed. “Do you expect your little mate to show for his welcoming feast, or do you that he plans to hide away in your cabin? He seemed quite shy when you two arrived—a far cry from the stories I've heard about him.”

“He has been through a lot,” Fenrir said, “more than that old fool Dumbledore had any right in asking from him. I do not know all the details, but I know that something broke him that night, and he fled the battle before it ended. That was when I caught his scent and went after him.”

“Perhaps it might be best to stave off his welcome until he feels more comfortable here, Alpha,” Xiang said gently, “war, death, and to be turned so suddenly, it must be weighing on him. Once he realizes that he's safe here, and feels more comfortable with us, he may then be more willing to accept a welcoming feast in his honour.”

 

~*~

 

Despite Harry's reluctance to listen to _anything_ that Greyback had to say, he had to admit (albeit grudgingly) that he was deeply exhausted from their trek to the man’s so-called _territory_. Unfortunately, his nervousness at the newness of everything around him had put him on edge, and no matter how much he tossed and turned on the expansive bed, he couldn’t get to sleep.

Outside, Harry could distantly hear the sound of the pack going about their usual business, and occasionally the soft rumble of Greyback's voice drifted above the others, and Harry hated how the sound of it made him feel safe. Harry shivered a little and rolled over, clamping a pillow firmly over his ear to stifle it. Whatever this was, it was _not_ Harry taking comfort in Greyback's presence. That was impossible. He was a werewolf, a killer—

— _But you're a werewolf now, too,_ a small voice in the back of his mind reminded him. _To be a werewolf is not a condemnation. Remus was one of the best, bravest, and kindest people you knew. Throwing out blanket statements like that is like spitting on his grave._

Harry's breath hitched at the thought of Remus, and of Tonks, and of poor little Teddy, orphaned, just as he had been, and his godfather gone away where he could not be reached. The parallels between his infancy and Teddy's burned in him, and he did not bother to try and stifle a sob as it bubbled up in his throat, and he burrowed his face farther into the pillow.

 

Harry didn't know when he'd fallen asleep, but when he next woke it was night, the clearest night he'd ever seen, and the starlight and moonlight above the territory was as bright as city lights. He was no longer alone in the bed, but woke to the now-familiar sensation of being embraced by Greyback. Harry tried to shake off the safety he found in the embrace, but in his vulnerable emotional state, he was finding that he did not care very much about who this comfort came from—he just needed someone else to bear his burden, even if it was only for a little while.

While he ignored the little prideful voice at the back of his mind that protested it, Harry rolled over to curl into the embrace, and Greyback tightened his hold on him. Instead of feeling trapped, Harry felt comforted, and this time sleep came to him much more easily.

 

The following morning Harry woke alone, but the scent of Greyback was heavy in the air like a perfume, and Harry could feel his anxieties begin to dissolve the moment he sensed it.

Was this what Greyback had meant when he spoke to that rogue wolf in the woods and said he'd _claimed_ Harry? he wondered, but Harry immediately shook his head a little in an effort to dispel the thought. It was beyond strange for Harry to wrap his mind around how quickly he had been uprooted from his life and planted down in this world where people could be claimed as easily as blinking. It didn’t feel right—shouldn’t people have more choice than this, or was part of being a werewolf having no choice anymore?

Harry shivered at the horrible thought, and wondered if it was even _worth_ trying to escape Greyback at this stage, or if he even _could_. If he’d been claimed like the man had said, did that mean he’d be able to catch up with him no matter where he went? Would he _ever_ be able to escape Greyback and find his way home?

The concept that he was trapped here made him feel sick. He slowly stood up from the bed, his mind plagued with a whirlwind of thoughts as tried to decide what to do, and at the same moment there was a knock on the door of the cabin, which effectively startled Harry from his thoughts.

Greyback did not exactly strike Harry as the type of person who would bother to knock on his own door, or to conduct himself with any sort of politeness to begin with. That, and Harry could smell something on the other side of it, scents that he did not associate with Greyback. The person who stood on the other side had almost a floral scent to them, and their natural musk was not as pungent, giving Harry the impression that whoever was there was a female, not a male.

Shaking himself off to rid his body of some of the tension in his muscles, he stepped forward to open the door, and it revealed an older woman of Asian descent, with a fluffy green towel under one arm, and a change of clothes under the other. Her silver hair was piled high on her head in a neat bun, and she had a warm, grandmotherly aura to her. At once, Harry felt some of his nervousness begin to fade.

“Good Morning, Alpha Bitch,” she said with a kind smile, “I brought you some clothes, and I thought I'd show you to our bathing area, I have a feeling you'd like to get out of those dirty rags that you are wearing.”

“Please,” Harry said, feeling a flush creep up his neck at the title, “it’s just Harry. And yes, please. That's very kind of you.”

“All right, _just Harry_ ,” she said with a chortle, the joke reminding Harry painfully of Hagrid. “I'm Xiang, one of the elder subs of the pack. Come with me.”

Harry followed her from the cabin without a word, and together they walked to the opposite side of the territory from where he'd arrived with Greyback the day before. They went down a short incline, and stopped at an area with low fences squaring off pools of steaming water, some small enough for one or two people, while others were clearly designed as communal baths, and were almost the size of small swimming pools. One of the larger ones was currently occupied by two older wolves who appeared to be in their mid-twenties, and half a dozen children between the ages of four and seven, all shrieking delightedly as they splashed in the hot water.

“Are these natural hot springs?” Harry asked curiously as she led him down to an available solitary bath, and she shook her head once.

“Unfortunately not,” she replied with a faint smile, “these were made from the river and elemental werewolf magic. They feel the same, though not as hot as naturally occurring hot springs.” She set down the towel and clothing she'd brought along at the edge of the pool, and offered him another small smile as she added, “I have some breakfast set aside for you when you finish, but take your time, my dear. You have almost as much authority as our alpha, and if you need something, all you have to do is ask.”

“Um, thanks,” Harry said uncomfortably, not looking at Xiang and instead training his eyes on the steaming pool of water as he spoke, “I'll, er, let you know.”

Something about the idea of him having some position of power over these people made him feel distinctly uncomfortable, though he guessed that she was saying it to be kind, not unnerve him. He smiled at her weakly, and she inclined her head once before heading back the way they had come.

Harry pushed the feeble door to the solitary bath shut, shed his dirty clothes, and left them in a pile in the corner while he slid into the hot water.

Immediately he let out a soft groan and tilted his head back against the side of the pool. He could feel every knot and ache in his body disappear almost instantly, and he wouldn't have minded if he could stay there in the pool all day. It made a blessed reprieve from the constant stress of the last few years, in particular, it was a welcome escape from Greyback, and all the chaos that had ensued since his flight from the battle.

_If I had known what would come of running away, I never would have,_ Harry thought miserably as he dipped his hands into the water, and splashed a little in his face. Regardless of how much dirt and grime fell off his skin however, it never stayed in the water for more than a few seconds before magically dissipating, and the hot bath became clear and clean again.

“I wish I knew what I’m supposed to do now,” Harry mumbled to himself as he eased back and gazed up at the clear blue sky. The idea of staying with Greyback made him feel sick, but when his first escape attempt had been such a monumental failure, he had no idea if trying again was even possible. Surely, Greyback would have taken steps to imprison him here?

_I don’t want to think about this right now when everything feels completely impossible,_ Harry thought as he turned his attention to the side of the little pool, where soap and hair potion had been laid out, and Harry set about properly washing himself.

 

By the time he left the pool, Harry felt like a whole new man, though his mind was still plagued by his worries over this bond, his lost friends, and everything else. Harry dressed in the clothes on that had been left for him, a pair of jeans and a dark blue T-shirt, which magically readjusted to fit him perfectly the moment he pulled them on.

Harry made his way back to the main area of the territory, but was stopped part of the way there by a now all-too-familiar voice.

“You found the baths, I see,” Greyback observed, pushing off the tree he'd been leaning against and sauntered forward, his eyes unabashedly taking in every inch of Harry’s form. The look made Harry feel both warm and uneasy at the same time, moreso when Greyback stopped directly in front of him and did not hesitate to wrap an arm around his waist and close the distance between them.

Harry’s breath hitched as the larger man's head bent forward, leaning in to take in Harry’s scent and trail his tongue along the side of Harry’s throat, as he seemed to like to do. Harry tensed, but before he could protest, Greyback eased up his hold on him slightly, though he still held him close. “Good. You were beginning to get more than a little ripe.”

“Um, Xiang showed me where they were,” Harry replied awkwardly, his breath hitching again as he became suddenly aware that the man was not just holding him, but _caressing_ him, and Harry felt his skin come alive with gooseflesh, though Greyback did not react to it one way or the other.

“I had Anaïs go to town and steal a paper for you,” he said, holding up a copy of the _Daily Prophet_ as evidence. “It would seem that you're still a fugitive.”

Harry's eyes dropped to the newspaper's headline _Harry Potter Still Unaccounted For, Wanted for Charges of Treason..._

Harry looked away, unable to read any more. His head bowed forward a little, and he felt a wave of anguish wash over him.

“I really can't go back, can I?” he asked softly, and Greyback answered by wrapping an arm more securely around his waist, and began to steer him back up to the encampment.

 

Greyback did not let go of Harry as he steered him towards the bonfire, which was encircled by roughly hewn benches made out of long, six and seven-foot logs. A few people were still sitting around them and eating, but passed Harry no second glance as he approached with their alpha.

Greyback pushed him down onto one of the logs, not roughly, but in firm silent command. Harry felt as though all fight had left him upon seeing that headline, and he did not protest as he sank down onto the wooden bench. He watched dully as the alpha strode away, and returned not three seconds later with a plate of food for him—eggs, potatoes, and some sort of ground meat fried like caseless sausage.

“Eat,” Greyback grunted, sitting down so closely to Harry that their legs rested thigh-to-thigh, and Harry obeyed silently, taking the plate from him with a soft, despondent sigh. One of Greyback's thick arms wrapped around his waist and squeezed him gently, making him shiver.

“No, you cannot go back,” he said at last, his soft tone telling Harry that the words were just for him, while he pierced a hunk of meat with his fork and popped it into his mouth, though he had no appetite whatsoever. “But that does not mean that your life has ended. Your place is here, by my side, and that is nowhere near as bad as you're making it out to be. With me, you will always be safe, you will always have food on your plate, and eventually it will also mean family. Had I not chased you, you would be facing a life on the run. Do you really want that?”

“No, I just...” Harry trailed off, and used eating as an excuse to stay silent while the tried to work out what he wanted to say. As they sat there, Harry felt Greyback inch closer to him; he could feel the alpha’s hot breath on his cheek, and the warmth of the heavy arm that encircled him, and more than the physical contact itself, Harry was alarmed by how _not_ alarmed he was by it. Something about his non-reaction was deeply unsettling, and this alone sent his heart into a furious rhythm, though he tried to appear just as calm as ever, to little effect.

“Why is it that I feel like...like...” Harry trailed off again. He felt his face burn a deep crimson, and Greyback chuckled softly.

“Like you should be less willing to accept my touch?” Greyback asked, and Harry nodded meekly. He chuckled and nipped at the shell of Harry's ear, which made it incredibly difficult to focus on the plate in his lap. Greyback's large hand squeezed Harry's hip, and Harry felt his face flame from the intimate touches.

“It is nothing to be ashamed of,” Greyback murmured in a voice close to a purr, and Harry shivered again. “Your human morals tend to fall into the background when you are gifted with The Bite. The wolf in you recognizes that I am the strongest, that I have laid claim upon you as a mate and breeding partner, and thus drains away your desire to fight me on that. It won't make you unnaturally compliant, or force you to do something wildly out of character, it merely concedes that I am the most ideal werewolf to bed you.”

That didn't make Harry feel any better. He bowed his head a little and ate quietly while Greyback continued to paw at him, while he tried to focus on what he should do, and ignore the burning guilt that was clawing at his insides for allowing this at _all_. He knew that without a wand, and to a lesser extent, without Greyback's protection, surely he would draw the attention of any dangerous, dominant rogue wolf in the wild, should he choose to run. _With_ his protection however came a heavy price—the expectation for Harry, as his mate, to carry children.

The idea was still too bizarre for Harry to completely wrap his head around, and when he pictured himself, rotund, pregnant belly sticking out from his normally flat abdomen, he couldn't help but shiver a little.

_Remus_ , Harry thought miserably, _I wish you were here to tell me what to do._

 

_~*~_

 

Pain.

Remus was aware only of an all-encompassing pain that seemed to tear through every cell in his body.

There was a rumbling beneath him, and it gave the impression that he was in a moving muggle vehicle of some kind—the low vibration that accompanied it made it sound as though he was in a car or van.

But that was impossible, wasn't it?

Remus cracked his eyes open, but it was too dark to see anything, even with his advanced werewolf sight. It was pure black, and he reached out to try and feel where he was and only then was he consciously aware that his wrists and ankles had been bound.

What was going _on_?

A scraping noise of metal on metal cut through the silence like a knife, and a rectangular beam of light broke through the darkness, illuminating that he was indeed in the back of some sort of van. There were bars across the little rectangle of a window, as though to stop Remus from reaching through it.

“Oi, Steve, 'e's awake!” a voice cried, and it was met by a low chuckle that made Remus shiver.

“Finally back with us, eh, wolfie?” the second voice said, “been out long enough. We thought you was dead, all them other werewolves at the battle got slaughtered, but not you, eh?”

“What—what do you want with me?” Remus rasped as he shot a glare at the light. The question had meant to be demanding, but in his weakened state, it sounded almost whispery and hoarse.

“We got _big_ plans for you, don't we, Steve?” said one of the men with a high, unsettling giggle that chilled Remus to the bone.

“Shut up, Geoff,” grunted the other, “'e don't need to know that yet.”

“You saved me,” Remus pressed as he squirmed in the bindings, but they refused to give. “You brought me far enough away from Hogwarts to a place where muggle technology would work properly, and now you've kidnapped me. What for?”

The man, Geoff, let out another high giggle as he slammed the eye-hole shut.

 


	5. First Moon

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Updates have officially been moved to Mondays for the foreseeable future, and the next update will be July 30th Enjoy!
> 
> **Possible Trigger Warning: Mild Dubcon**   
>  **Content Warning: Werewolf Violence**

Chapter Five – First Moon

Fenrir watched as his little mate curled in on himself while he ate his fill, and mumbled his thanks when he set the plate aside, before he hastily untangled himself from the larger wolf and slipped off, his head bowed.

Had it been a mistake, Fenrir wondered, to update him on the happenings of the wizarding world, the same world Potter had seemed so keen to flee from?

 

“Trouble, Alpha?”

Fenrir turned, and caught sight of his youngest dominant child, Sheehan. His long blond hair had been pulled away from his face in a braid that trailed down to the small of his back, and his green eyes—so different from his little mate's—shone brightly in the sun like twin ornaments of jade.

“You could say that,” he replied with a small huff of frustration, turning back to Potter's slumped form as it disappeared into the trees. He wasn't worried—the boy wasn't stupid enough to try running off again, not after what had happened with the rogues—and if he did, his sentries would drag him back quickly enough.

“He'll need time to acclimate to life here,” Sheehan said confidently, watching the same point that Fenrir had been. “Most turned wolves need some time, and to claim him so quickly...it's probably a big adjustment for him.”

“Hm,” Fenrir grunted, crossing his arms across his chest. Though his son was right, it was still difficult to wrap his head around the concept that this boy wasn't as keen to be taken to bed as he would have liked. What sort of sub _wouldn’t_ want him? He was Alpha, for fuck’s sake—he was the strongest, there was no earthly reason for Potter to continue to reject him like this.

“Perhaps it may be a good idea to send one of the subs to befriend him—though maybe not Caomh.” Sheehan laughed, and lifted his hand in a casual farewell before he stepped off to see to his duties for the day.

It wasn't an awful idea, all things considered. Fenrir rested his thumb against his chin as he thought, and was half-tempted to send Caomh—if nothing else, to see if he could indeed be civil towards his new mate. However, he didn't need Potter— _no,_ he thought—he didn’t need _Harry_ to be any more stressed by all the newness that had been suddenly thrust into his life, and turned to his various pack members milling about, and tried to decide who might be best-suited to the task.

 

~*~

 

Harry pressed his back into the rough bark of the tree, and heaved a soft sigh. He slid to the ground, and stared off to the sharp incline of the mountain, the tall trees that cast its shade over them, and listened to the soft background noise of the pack going about their day. The distant forest before him was shadowed, and as Harry gazed at it, he felt a distinct pang in his chest, like something that was just out of reach—home.

 

_I will never escape this place, I will never get home._

 

A solitary tear dripped down Harry’s cheek, and he roughly brushed it away. His humanity was lost, as much as his old life was. Mourning it with tears wasn't going to bring it back.

Harry had barely begun to compose himself when he heard the heavy footfalls of someone approaching. He looked up, and Harry saw a young man coming towards him, perhaps in his late twenties or early thirties, with mussed black hair. He was tall, well over six feet, with broad shoulders and a trim waist. His skin was a deep golden brown, the colour accented by all the time he spent in the sun, and his eyes were a lighter shade than his hair, somewhere between a light brown and honey gold.

“Hi there, Alpha Bitch,” he greeted with a warm smile, and Harry felt himself flush at the title.

“Harry,” he corrected, grimacing at how small his voice sounded compared to this man's.

“Harry, then,” he said, and sat down next to him, though a good foot away from him. After how touchy Greyback had been earlier it was a little strange to see someone actually respecting his personal space, though a welcome change all the same. “I'm Shannon, one of the subs of the pack. Any particular reason why you're sitting out here all alone?”

“Um...” Harry cleared his throat a little as he tried to get over the shock at the idea that this man—who would not look out of place in a Hollywood action film—was a _submissive wolf_. It simply did not compute with what he'd pictured when Fenrir had told him that he was the same. “Just thinking,” he said at last, shrugging feebly. “'S a lot to take in.”

“Yeah, it can be a little overwhelming,” he said, leaning back a little, his hands gripping his left knee, while he stretched his right leg out in front of him. “I was turned when I was ten. Alpha...he was struggling with some things, and he saved me from...well, let's just say he spared me a lifetime of pain, if I were to put it mildly.”

“That's putting it _mildly_?” Harry asked with an arched brow. After seeing how Remus had dealt with his Lycanthropy, Harry was mightily confused as to how this man could regard it as a blessing and not a curse.

“I was brought to this country when I was little, by men,” he said, his voice darkening slightly as he stared off into the distance. “Bad men. Child Labourers, Slavers, Pimps...whatever you'd like to call them. They smuggled us out of Sri Lanka and brought us here to work. My mum thought they were good men—they had promised to bring me to England to live with my father. _Such a progressive country, you'll be safe there,_ they said, and...well, I wasn't. When I'd worked out what they had planned I fought back, they beat me until I passed out, and then dumped me on the roadside. Alpha found me.

“Had it not been for him, I probably would not have survived the night,” Shannon continued as he stretched his legs out in front of him, and braced his weight on his hands as he leant back and gazed up at the sky. He turned to look at Harry, and smiled softly, “he's not what you think. Give him a chance. He may surprise you.”

Harry frowned, and fleetingly he wondered if Greyback had told this man to come talk to him. He pulled his legs up to his chest and balanced his chin on his knees.

“I'm not...” Harry trailed off with a heavy sigh, and tried again. “I don't have anything against werewolves. One of my dad's best friends was one, and I only got to know him for a short time but...he was like...like an uncle to me. I’ve never held any of the prejudices most wizards have for them, but Greyback...He hasn't exactly acted like the pure soul or hero or whatever you want to call it that you lot paint him as.”

“Werewolves have their own code of ethics,” Shannon said simply, as though that explained everything. “Laws of the wild apply out here more than Man's Law, and we take what we want—we do not ask for it. For us, it is that simple. Alpha may have turned you against your will, but in doing so he's saved you, and given you a wonderful gift.”

“How is turning into a—a _creature_ once a month a gift?” Harry grumbled, just barely managing to swallow the word, _monster_.

“I didn't mean that,” Shannon replied patiently, “I mean the other gift. He has given you a family.”

“What if it's a family that I don't want?” Harry asked, frowning as he stared down at the forest floor.

“That isn't how families work,” Shannon said with a soft chuckle. “Your family is given to you, you cannot choose it. You have here a net of people here who want to get to know you, who want to take care of you, who want to see you grow into the leader that you were meant to be. We do not want anything from you—at least not in the way you're thinking.”

Harry stared at him dubiously. It was quite obvious what Greyback wanted from him, and as the vague thought reminded Harry of what the alpha wanted, he shivered again.

“Alpha would not ask anything from you that you are not ready to give wholeheartedly,” Shannon said gently, “he is a gruff man—not one for showing his emotions. It might be viewed as a weakness to those that may wish to usurp him. No matter his bravado, Fenrir Greyback is not a rapist.”

Following his words, Shannon stood and offered Harry a smile and a small nod. “When you are ready to join us in the clearing, let me know.”

Without another word the werewolf strode off, and Harry watched him go silently. He didn't feel as though he'd _ever_ be ready to willingly join with the pack—with the man who had changed Remus's life so irrevocably. As he sat there, memories of their trek from the Scottish highlands to...wherever they were now flooded back to him, and Harry shivered a little as he recalled those few times he'd been held by or touched Greyback. Even now, Harry could not completely deny how _right_ it had felt, like he’d belonged there, almost as though his true purpose had been discovered at last.

Harry shook his head violently to dispel the thought.

_True purpose?_ He thought incredulously, _to what, be Fenrir effing Greyback's brood mare?_

Harry drew his knees back up to his chest and buried his face in them with a groan. Everything was so confusing, and he had no idea what was right and what was wrong anymore. Part of him desperately wanted what Greyback was offering—home, family, safety. But another part of him screamed in negation at the very thought, and a wave of guilt closely followed his longing when he remembered what had happened to Remus at Greyback's hands—or claws, as the case may be.

 

Harry did not know how long he sat there, but the soft crunching of heavy footfalls in the leaf litter signalled Harry to the approach of another werewolf. He looked up and felt his stomach knot apprehensively when he saw the familiar form of Greyback stepping towards him.

Unwilling to show fear to this man, Harry stayed stock still, but watched his every move warily. _What is he up to?_ Harry wondered, and struggled to keep from jumping away when Greyback sat so close to him that their thighs brushed together.

“You didn't come back up for lunch,” Greyback rumbled simply, and set down a platter in front of Harry containing some sort of roast meat, grilled vegetables, a bread roll studded with seeds, and a water skin.

“Er, thanks,” Harry mumbled while he picked up the roll and began to pick the seeds out and eat them, though he didn't feel particularly hungry. He felt his stomach knot in something close to panic as Greyback closed the distance between them, and Harry felt as though he'd been completely enveloped by the heady, musky scent that he'd come to associate with the older man. More alarming still was how _not_ alarmed he was by this closeness.

Harry dropped the roll, and it landed on the edge of the platter. He buried his face in his hands and took a deep breath as his body began to tremble.

_This isn't right,_ Harry thought viciously, _this_ can't _be right. This is_ Greyback _for God's sake, why do I feel safer with him than I ever did with Ron, or Hermione, or anyone else?_

“Your wolf wants me,” Greyback murmured, his low voice escaping him as little more than a purr, and Harry shivered at the sound of it. “Your pesky human morals are keeping you from taking what you want, regardless how right it is for you to want me—want _this._ ” Harry's breath hitched when he felt Greyback's teeth nip at his exposed throat.

Harry expected Greyback to do something lewd and sexual next, but he was surprised when the infamous werewolf did no more than press the roll back into Harry's hands.

“Eat,” Greyback urged, “you need to keep up your strength.”

Harry obeyed, if nothing else to keep himself from asking _for what_.

He had a feeling that he wouldn't like the answer.

 

~*~

 

It had been nineteen days since they’d returned to the territory, and still Fenrir’s little mate was as frigid as a stale old bitch.

Fenrir gritted his teeth in an effort to swallow his growl of frustration as he felt Harry wiggle out from under his arm and disappear into the grey morning light. He did not seem to notice that Fenrir had been awake the last six mornings he'd pulled this little stunt, or, if he did, he didn't seem to care; his solitary goal was always to escape Fenrir's embrace as quickly as he could.

He'd listened to the advice of the mated wolves of his pack, and of his children, save Caomh, who was still bitching endlessly about his choice of a mate whenever he thought Fenrir was too far off to overhear. From the others he’d been given a variety of different kinds of advice, and he had done everything they suggested.

Give Harry space, approach him gently, do not use force. “ _Let Harry come to you,_ ” they had all said, but it had made no difference. The only time he got any contact with his little mate was during the night when he slipped in after Harry had fallen asleep, and he drew his young man into his arms.

Even now, he'd committed Harry's scent to memory. It spoke of the powerful cubs he would bear when the time was right, and the strength of Harry himself; it was intoxicating. Fenrir wanted him— _all_ of him—meanwhile, Harry wanted nothing to do with Fenrir.

With the oncoming Moon that night, emotions within the pack had been running high in the lead-up to it, and his patience with Harry was stretched to the absolute limit. He'd lashed out at more than one of his Dominants during the past few days, and many of them had learnt quickly to give the alpha his space until things between him and their newest pack member had calmed down.

This morning, Fenrir had no patience for Harry's avoidance games. He lay stretched out upon their bed, unmoving while he waited for Harry to finish his morning bath. Usually, he'd clear out before Harry got back to give the young man some space, but this morning he decided for a more direct approach to moving things forward.

Twenty minutes passed, and Harry returned to the cabin with his hair still a little damp from his bath, and his expression was pinched, clearly lost in thought. He froze upon the threshold however when he spotted Fenrir still laying in bed, and the alpha arched a brow at him.

“Close the door, you're letting in a draft,” he rumbled, and with jerky, halting movements, Harry slowly stepped farther inside and let the door snap shut behind him. He looked as though Fenrir had asked him to walk barefoot across hot coals, and with a irritated huff he stood up and stalked towards his young mate. Harry's eyes bulged in their sockets and he scuttled back, and his back hit the wood of the door with an audible _flump_.

“G-Greyback, I—”

“—quiet,” he growled, and Harry's mouth snapped shut. Fenrir stopped a hairsbreadth away from him, and pressed his palms against the wood of the door on either side of the young man's head as he leant in close, but did not physically touch him—yet.

“I have to wonder,” he murmured, “have you been so mistreated in these last weeks that you have reason to flinch from my touch?” Fenrir reached up, and as expected, Harry winced as though he'd been struck. Fenrir growled softly in frustration, but continued on as though he had not noticed the young man's reaction, and allowed the sharpened edge of his nail skitter across Harry's cheek, though nowhere near hard enough to leave a mark.

“What is it that scares you so, Harry Potter?” he purred, and continued to ignore the look of abject horror in the youth's eyes as his hand trailed downward and pressed against his hard abdomen. Unless he was very much mistaken, he was quite certain that he heard Harry let out a soft whimper of fear.

“Is it perhaps that you recall your place in the pack is to bear cubs for me?” he murmured, and brushed his thumb across Harry's flat stomach. “You do not look forward to seeing yourself swollen with my seed—with my offspring?” Fenrir groaned softly, and shifted so as to keep Harry from noticing how hard he was getting from his own words. He wasn’t trying to scare his mate—not _really—_ he just wanted to prove a point. “Regardless what may you think of me, I would not do such a thing without your permission. You are my mate, not my...harem boy.”

The words did not placate Harry as much as Fenrir had hoped that they would, and with a possessive growl he shifted his hand to the young man's hip, giving in at last to _take_ what he wanted, and closed the distance between them as he crushed their lips together.

Harry taste sweetly of innocence, of his loss, and of raw, untamed _power_. Fenrir longed to be the one to take that innocence from him—and make him love every second of it. Fenrir growled again, sucking Harry’s lower lip into his mouth, teasing it with his tongue, while the hand at the sub’s hip snaked to his back, and he drew his mate closer.

The physical contact accomplished what his words alone could not, and he both felt and heard Harry let out a soft moan of longing, though he still remained stock-still, and refused to participate in the kiss. With the Moon so close, his wolf was in more control than his human mind was, and Fenrir knew that his verbal reaction was a response of instinct alone. The fact that time and time again Harry's wolf chose him made Fenrir swell with both pride and desire, and with a sharp growl, he yanked the young man even closer, until they were crushed together from lips to groin.

Harry reached for him, tentatively at first, and his stubby fingernails scratched at Fenrir’s bare chest slightly as his fingers twined through his coarse chest hair. Fenrir grunted his approval and reached down to squeeze his mate's buttocks, holding Harry against him, but it was as though that particular touch forced the spell that they were under to abruptly break, and Harry froze.

Fenrir reluctantly broke the kiss and looked down at his mate, keeping his gaze hard, but at the same time, he made his desire for him clear.

“Your wolf wants me, and so do you—the Moon tonight makes you want me even more,” he murmured, nipping at Harry's bottom lip lightly, while the boy trembled with a sudden burst of fright, likely from the reminder that tonight was to be his first Moon. “I want you even more when my scent is all over you like this.”

He tasted Harry's golden column of flesh, pausing at the hollow of his throat to bite down on the bare skin he found there. Harry's breath hitched in surprise, but Fenrir did not break the skin, merely suckled on the flesh to mark what was his. When he was certain that the spot would bruise, he straightened up and headed out of the cabin to begin his day, ignoring both Harry’s flushed face and the distinctive bulge in the sub’s trousers as he went.

 

~*~

 

“It's no good, Hermione,” Neville said as he arrived back at Grimmauld Place, stepping in the front door with little Pig clamped in is hand. “There's too much magic in the air wherever Harry is for this muggle contraption to work properly.” He released the excitedly twittering owl, and it flew directly at Ron and began to circle his head. “Do you have a Plan B?”

Hermione's face fell at his words, and she slumped down into one of the sitting room's armchairs.

“No, that was the only idea I had,” she said, her eyes glistening a little, “what are we going to do now? How are we supposed to find H-Harry?”

Hermione buried her face in her hands as a tiny sob of despair escaped her, and Ron lurched forward as though to go comfort her, then he suddenly stopped short.

“Hermione!” he cried suddenly, his eyes shining excitedly.

“What?” she asked, her tone wary as she regarded her boyfriend.

“The Marauder's Map!”

“What about it? Harry's not at Hogwarts, I don't see how it'll do us much—” Ron cut her off before she could finish.

“I _mean_ , the magic that makes The Marauder's Map work! Maybe we could create our own, keyed to Harry!”

“I dunno, Ron, that's some awfully complex magic to apply to such a big area,” Hermione said doubtfully, her mouth twisted into a grimace, “and if Harry's behind some sort of magical warding, he might not even show up.”

“Well aren't you a right bloody ray of sunshine,” Ron countered sarcastically, and Hermione's frown deepened. “McGonagall and Flitwick are in and out of here all the time now, we could probably enlist their help, at least to see if it can be done.”

“What's The Marauder's Map?” Neville asked.

Both Ron and Hermione turned to him as though just remembering that he was there, and they both flushed in embarrassment as they offered him weak, apologetic smiles. Neville didn’t mind so much—he was quickly learning that there was a lot that he didn’t know about Harry, and whenever he asked things now, Ron and Hermione were always quick to fill him in and include him in plans, which certainly helped to make him feel like he was part of the team, and not merely tagging along.

“It's a map of Hogwarts,” Hermione explained. “Harry's dad, along with Lupin, Sirius Black, and Peter Pettigrew, created it when they were in school. It shows every person who's occupying the school at any given time, even if they're in disguise.”

“Wow,” Neville breathed, “that sounds incredible. Where is it?”

“Lost, or Harry still has it,” Ron said with a wince, “we’re not exactly sure.” Hermione nodded in agreement, and Neville blinked in confusion.

“Okay, if Harry has it, how are we supposed to replicate it?” he asked as he looked from Ron to Hermione and back again.

“Which is why I said let's talk to Flitwick and McGonagall!” Ron replied, “Hermione, you've practically memorized at least three-quarters of the Hogwarts library so you probably don't _need_ the Map in order to copy it, anyway.”

Hermione flushed a deep scarlet at the compliment, and Neville smiled a little, despite the faint twinge of jealousy he felt at the look of affection in Ron's gaze as he looked at her. Neville wasn’t jealous of Hermione, not in the strictest sense, but looking at them made him think of Luna, who had politely declined his offer to help find Harry, in favour of leaving the country for an extended holiday with her father. Neville didn’t blame her, though he did miss her.

“Well, Ron has a point, Hermione,” Neville said as he forced himself back to the present. “You were the highest in our year, if anyone could do it, it'd be you.”

Hermione smiled warmly, clearly pleased with herself, and didn't correct either of the boys as she said, “all right, all right...we can _ask_ them, but I don’t think this will work...”

“Brilliant,” Ron said with another winning grin, and Hermione rolled her eyes at her boyfriend.

 

~*~

 

The remainder of the day passed slowly, and Harry did not once move from the cabin that he shared with Greyback.

He sat huddled in a corner, his thoughts troubled, while he tried to ignore the compulsion he kept having to seek Greyback out, and he pointedly ignored the strange physical irritations that had plagued him since he'd had his bath that morning.

His teeth itched, his skin felt unnaturally hot, and his bones ached as though he was suddenly suffering from exceptionally bad growing pains. It _hurt_ , and he didn’t know why.

Not that he planned to do anything about it, and Harry glared sullenly down at the dirt floor of the cabin. He could ride this out; he wasn’t weak.

And a little pain was certainly better than going to see _Greyback_ about it.

In the late afternoon, the door to the cabin creaked open and Harry glanced up apprehensively. He saw Greyback there, and Harry’s mouth twitched into a frown; Greyback was the _last_ person he wanted to see right now. Greyback held aloft a plate of cooked meats in one hand, and a small glass jar in the other, which seemed to contain some sort of thick, pale yellow lotion.

Greyback stepped farther into the cabin, and set aside the food upon one of the benches around the fire as he shot Harry an annoyed glare, and sat down near to the empty fire pit.

“Come here, Harry,” he rumbled in a commanding tone, but Harry forced himself to stay still. In part because he did not want to bend to this man's every whim _just_ because he was the alpha, but also because it hurt to move.

“No,” he growled, and Greyback rolled his eyes. He stood up with a grunt of annoyance and stalked over to him. He grabbed Harry by the shoulder and forced him to his feet, but before Harry could stop himself he let out a yelp of pain. The sudden movement pulled harshly at his left hamstring, and Greyback glared at him as understanding illuminated his azure eyes. Ignoring Harry's continued minor vocalizations of pain, he dragged him over to the log where he'd been sitting, and forced him down.

“How many times,” Greyback growled while he knelt behind Harry, “do I have to tell you that if you are in pain, hungry, _anything,_ you are to come to me? I'm your mate, for fuck's sake, it's my _job_ to meet your goddamn needs.”

Harry gritted his teeth at the word _mate,_ and forced himself to keep quiet. He wasn't anyone's _mate_ , and certainly not Greyback's, no matter what the werewolf claimed. He knew vocalizing it would just lead to another debate, which he was too tired for at the moment, but the silence seemed to do the job of making his feelings known, and the alpha growled.

Unfortunately, Harry had been too busy trying to balance his anger and bodily pain to notice what Greyback was doing. Harry jumped in surprise when the alpha's large hands suddenly snaked under the hem of his shirt, slick with whatever had been in the jar, and Greyback began to massage the knotted muscles that he found there.

Despite Harry's best efforts, he felt himself melting under Greyback's practised touch, and he let out a low moan of contentment. Greyback gently coaxed Harry to move until he was straddling the bench, with Greyback sitting right behind him in the same fashion. The older man's hands worked up and down Harry’s spine expertly, along his shoulders, and down his arms, then moved to the waistband of Harry's jeans and began to tug them off.

“No...” Harry mumbled weakly, but even as he said it, he shifted and allowed Greyback to remove the garment. He found that in his haze of relaxation, it was difficult to refuse the man and actually _mean_ it. He could feel himself aching with lust—a lust that was fixated upon only one person, which both confused and frightened Harry in equal measure. Despite the sheer wrongness of it, Harry _wanted_ Fenrir Greyback to touch him.

Much to Harry's surprise however, Greyback did not try to ravage him once the garment was off. Instead, he used more of the lotion, or salve, or whatever it was, and continued his rubdown, paying particular attention to the muscle Harry had pulled earlier.

“It is your first Moon, Harry,” Greyback said in a much gentler tone than Harry would have expected as he continued his work, “your wolf is ready to burst through your skin. There is little anyone can do to ease this first transformation, but I can help you through it, you just need to get it into that thick skull of yours that I can _help_.”

Harry felt himself flush, and he kept his gaze upon the distant wall of the cabin and away from Greyback, while he tried to ignore the distinct tenting of his pants, which left nothing to the imagination.

“I can take care of myself,” Harry answered, his mind still a fog as Greyback's rough hands began to slowly snake their way back up his thighs. “I—I don't need help.”

“Yes, you do. That is what I'm trying to get into that thick skull of yours,” Greyback growled, “as your mate, I am _expected_ to help you.”

Greyback pressed the heel of his large palm against Harry's straining erection suddenly, and Harry let out a low grunt of pleasure in spite of himself.

“N-no...” Harry tried again, but his voice was weak and uncertain. The hand there felt so _good_ , and it had been so _long_ since anyone had touched him in this way. If he was being honest with himself, he did not want Greyback to stop.

“Do you really want me to stop, Harry?” Greyback purred as he slipped his hand under the elastic waistband of Harry’s pants, and took his cock in hand. The alpha’s rough, work-worn hands were still slick from the lotion, and the combined sensations made Harry's head spin. He let out a low whine as he tilted his head back against Greyback’s shoulder, and he felt himself go red when the older man let out a low chuckle.

“You want me, and your wolf wants me,” Greyback continued while he slowly began to stroke Harry's aching cock. Harry almost wanted to weep—it felt so _good_. Harry hated himself for bending to the alpha's whims to readily, and he shook his head a little to Greyback's words, his voice lost to him in his haze of pleasure, Harry knew that if he opened his mouth, all that would come out was a moan; he refused to show Greyback how much he was enjoying his touch. “I am the most powerful wolf here; it is natural for you to want me.”

“N-no...” Harry mumbled as he shook his head weakly, and his breath hitched as Greyback's thumb brushed over the tip of his leaking cock. “C-can't...n-not right...”

“Harry, look at me,” Greyback ordered, but Harry kept his eyes downcast. He squeezed Harry's cock, and a soft moan passed Harry's lips before he could stop it. Harry was trembling as he fought the urge to thrust into Greyback's hand, to turn, grab the older man, and pull himself flush against him. He wouldn't do it—he _couldn't_ do it.

When Harry did not respond to the command, Greyback let out a low growl as he circled Harry, forcing the sub to face his mate, and sped up his movements when he settled back down. Harry grunted as he dug his nails into the wood of the bench, his eyes clenched shut, but despite his best efforts, his hips jerked weakly.

When Harry came, his tenuous control over his bodily reactions snapped, and he lurched forward. His teeth sunk into Greyback's collarbone and his stubby nails scrabbled at the hard chest, and he groaned loudly as the alpha milked his orgasm from him, his hand moving with such fluid expertise that Harry had to wonder just how many men Greyback had jerked off before him.

Panting harshly, Harry tried to pull away, ashamed of himself for giving in so readily, but an arm around his waist pinned him there without effort. Harry couldn't look up; he didn’t want to see Greyback’s smirk of victory for making him cum, but in his peripheral vision, he caught sight of Greyback licking his hand clean.

“I could smell and sense your power even before I turned you, Harry,” Greyback rumbled a moment later, “and I can _taste_ it too.” He combed his fingers through Harry's thick hair, and Harry tried to not let himself enjoy it. “Before the night is out, you will want me as surely as I want you.”

For the second time that day Greyback left Harry alone, and the moment the door had snapped shut behind him, Harry let out a low groan and buried his face in his hands. What was he going to _do_?

After that, Harry knew that all of Greyback's insistence that Harry was meant for him felt so much more real. He felt a stirring of desire that went beyond momentary arousal, and he shivered a little. It almost felt like a betrayal to Remus to feel such desire for a man not only so much older than him, but also the one who had turned Remus in the first place.

Harry didn't want to want him.

But he did.

 

~*~

 

Over a hundred miles away in a dingy little van, Remus Lupin was having a far less pleasant day than Harry was.

He had been freed of his bindings, and to his horror, forcibly stripped by his captors’ wands in preparation for the full moon.

Remus burned with embarrassment in the face of their cruel jeers when they’d opened the back of the van, revealing that it had to be a stolen dog catcher’s van of some kind, for he found himself behind a barricade of thick chain link, keeping him from hurting the men in any way. It also enabled Remus to catch both a glimpse of where they were—though he saw little beyond a stretch of road bracketed by tall wheat fields, and at last, he was able to put a face to his kidnappers.

The man on the left was short and round, perhaps barely a head taller than Filius Flitwick was. He was bald, and his cheeks were covered with sporadic grey facial hair. The one on the right was tall and muscular, with bristly black hair and dark moustache flecked with white. Both men looked like people he would never dare try to cross.

“Soon, wolfie,” the shorter one, who he recognized by his voice as Steve, said. “Soon, you'll be worth your weight in gold to us...or silver, as the case may be. A small fortune, riding in the back of our van.”

Remus glanced to the glow of the sunset through the mesh, and back to the two men. They were watching him intently, waiting for reaction, but between the aftershocks of the battle and the oncoming moon, his mind was fuzzy and lost as to what they planned for him.

“What—what are you on about?” Remus demanded, and shuddered as he felt the sun begin to sink below the horizon, and Moony began to scrabble at his insides, desperate to get out. Remus fought it as best he could—he needed answers as to what these men had planned for him, and he needed them _now_.

“You went to school, wolfie,” Steve taunted, “tell me, what's the average take for werewolf pelts, organs, and fangs down Knockturn Alley?”

Remus felt the bottom drop out of his stomach as the realization hit him full-force, like a sharp blow to the gut.

_Poachers._

 

~*~

 

The orange glow of sunset illuminated the territory, and Fenrir could feel his wolf just beneath his skin, scratching feverishly to get out.

The cubs were weaving through everyone's legs, snapping at each other and tumbling together as they played roughly, almost as though they had turned already. The submissive wolves were off to one side, cleaning up from their early evening meal, and the dominants were positioned around the edge of the territory, keeping an eye on everything.

One person was still missing, however.

Harry.

This wasn't unexpected, but it was still enough to make Fenrir gnash his teeth in frustration. He turned, intent on dragging the stupid boy from their cabin, kicking and screaming if he had to, but he was surprised when he saw Harry inching slowly towards the assembled pack.

His arms were wrapped around himself and head bowed forward slightly, as though he was doing his best to go unnoticed. He saw more than a few of the nearby subs' noses flare, and their eyes darted between Harry and Fenrir, clearly sensing what they had done earlier. At least his pack had the good sense to not say anything—his little mate was stressed enough already.

Harry sidled up to Fenrir, moving closer than he would have expected his sub to, and he placed a large hand against the small of the young man's back, holding him close. Fenrir felt Harry's muscles relax slightly under the touch, though none of it showed on his face, which still looked strained and nervous.

“It's good to see you out of our cabin,” Fenrir said approvingly, and smirked a little at the way Harry went bright red when he spoke the word, _our._

_He's so naïve, even after all he's seen,_ Fenrir thought with fond amusement, _I'll definitely enjoy his first Breeding Season with us. Shame August is still over two months away..._

“I, er...” Harry trailed off, his face still tomato-red, while Fenrir began to trace small circles upon his back with the heel of his palm.

“I would have had to drag you out anyway, I don't fancy you tearing up our cabin in your wolf state,” Fenrir murmured, his hand snaking under the hem of the young man's shirt to brush his rough, weathered hands against his mate’s velvet-soft skin. Harry shivered a little under his touch, but did not openly reject it, which was a good sign.

The orange horizon began to give way to the deep indigo of twilight, and around them the rest of the pack began to shed their sparse clothing and set it aside.

Fenrir had completely forgotten that wizards were not quite as used to such easy acceptance of nudity in this way, and after shedding his own clothing, he turned to see that Harry hadn't moved to disrobe at all.

“If you don't undress, it will be _very_ uncomfortable when you transform,” Fenrir said with as much patience as he could muster. He never much understood humans' obsession with decency, and with the oncoming moon, keeping his emotions in check was proving to be incredibly difficult. His wolf wanted _out_.

His face still the same shade as a ripened tomato, Harry ducked behind a tree, and Fenrir listened to the soft rustle of his clothes being shed. Fenrir rolled his eyes at his mate’s attitude, but he curbed the impulse to openly protest it.

At nearly the same moment, Fenrir felt the pull—the irresistible pull of the moon calling to her children. From behind the tree, Fenrir heard Harry's keening moan of pain.

He went to his mate, and found the young man curled in on himself, his fingertips digging into his chest as though he was trying to claw it open, eyes rolled up in his head as he trembled violently, clearly fighting the change. He wasn’t fully undressed, and Fenrir was quick to peel off the remaining undergarments and single sock, as well as his glasses, which Harry did not protest.

“Let go, Harry,” Fenrir murmured, gritting his teeth as he rubbed Harry's back, holding back his own transformation as he spoke, “just give in to it— _let go._ ”

“H-hurts...” Harry hissed through gritted teeth, and Fenrir caught sight of the pinpricks of tears in the corners of his eyes.

“Accept your wolf,” Fenrir encouraged, “he wants to taste the moon, that's it, let go...”

Harry cried out, and he lurched forward as his transformation took hold. His chest heaved, he dug his fingers into the hard earth, and he gagged as though he was about to be sick.

Fenrir allowed his own transformation to take him, and through the haze of familiar pain, he watched Harry, and instead of a grey, brown, or tawny wolf, he watched as Harry transformed into a small black wolf—the same as himself.

Harry's transformation finished almost at the same moment that Fenrir's did, though while Fenrir stood and shook himself, Harry did not move.

The sub lay perfectly still, ears flat against his head, eyes tightly shut, and his entire body was pressed against the ground, as though he was trying to make himself as small as possible. He was still whimpering softly, and his entire body shook; it seemed like Harry was caught in a state of shock from the change, which was not unexpected, but still somewhat distressing to see.

Fenrir approached the little wolf, and while around him the others of his pack had begun to get up and shake off the after-effects of the change, but still Harry had not moved.

He nudged the small wolf with the tip of his nose, and the sub’s eyes flicked open, still the same vibrant green that they were in his human form. He could hear Harry's soft whimpers, and looked up at Fenrir reproachfully, but the alpha did not move. He nudged him again, and Harry stood on unsteady legs, as shaky as a newborn fawn. When his gaze moved from Fenrir to the others, Harry seemed to panic and pressed himself into Fenrir's side. The move was so fast that Fenrir was certain that it was unconscious—his wolf finally overtaking his human mind, and instinctually, he knew who would protect him.

Fenrir bumped his muzzle against Harry's in an affectionate, reassuring gesture. It was one he never would have gotten away with had the boy been in his human form, and slowly began to coax him towards the rest of the pack. He was reluctant, whimpering and backtracking frequently, moreso when the pack itself began to crowd him. Harry's ears flattened against his head, his lip curled back, and he snapped at one of the cubs who had gotten too close. The cub yelped and scuttled back, hiding behind his mother's leg while he looked up uncertainly at the Alpha Bitch.

Fenrir growled at Harry in warning, but the young wolf seemed to be beyond reason, far too anxious to accept the pack in his current state, and Fenrir knew well how dangerous a nervous werewolf could be. He backed up, intending to let Harry run off to calm down before he tried again to introduce him to the pack, but Caomh jumped in before Fenrir could stop him, and he snapped at Harry, snarling dangerously.

The Alpha shouldered between his mate and his cub before any real damage could be done, and he snapped at Caomh in return, growling in warning, his shoulders squared in a stance that screamed _just try it_. Caomh's tail drooped a little, his expression startled, as though he truly had not expected Fenrir to come to the aid of his mate.

Instead of trying to take on his father or backing down, Caomh tried to circle around him to get at Harry. Fenrir snapped again, snarling. He was unwilling to hurt his child if he didn’t have to, but if push came to shove, he would.

It took several tense minutes before Caomh finally relented, and bowed his head a little in supplication. Fenrir let out a short huff of frustration at his ridiculous child, then turned to Harry, only to find him gone. He lifted his gaze, and saw a flicker of darkness near the treeline, and turned his back on the rest of the pack to see to his mate.

Harry was sitting behind a tree, visibly shaking as though he was absolutely terrified. His chest was heaving, and the moment Fenrir appeared, he raised his hackles in clear warning: _don't come any closer._

Fenrir ignored the warning and closed the space between them, a growl rumbling low in his throat like a purr as he rubbed up against the smaller werewolf. He could feel Harry beginning to relax a little as he seemed to realize that Fenrir meant him no harm, but he was still very tense. Fenrir stood over his mate, licking at his ears, grooming the flyaway chunks of fur, and when Fenrir could sense his tension finally beginning to melt away, he tried again to get him to interact with the pack.

Like the last time, Harry was still reluctant, though this time Fenrir suspected that it may be thanks in no small part from Caomh's clear animosity towards him, rather than simple, generalized anxiety. With Fenrir at his side however, Harry slowly and haltingly made his way over to the pack, his tail tucked between his legs and pressed firmly into his mate’s side.

The pack stayed back, waiting patiently for them to approach, and Harry continued to press hard into Fenrir’s side, almost as though he hoped to disappear before the others saw him. The attitude utterly perplexed Fenrir as he silently continued to urge Harry forward. Harry had never been the kind to fear anything, and his natural personality should have bled into his wolf, not this trembling fearful version of himself instead. Part of him wondered if he should just leave Harry to come to them on his own, but that was no way for a new alpha to act, and Fenrir knew instinctually that allowing his mate to act the part of a skittish omega would do more harm than good; beyond the need for his mate become comfortable with the pack, it was imperative that the pack accept him as one of their leaders as well.

When they were barely ten feet away Harry let out a soft whimper, and Fenrir dropped his gaze to the little wolf, following his line of sight, and he found it fixed upon Caomh.

His son’s gaze was fixed firmly upon the ground, acting as though Harry did not exist. Fenrir ignored Harry's reluctance as well as his son’s attitude, and continued to coax him towards the rest of the pack, stopping just short of them. Almost at once, an elderly wolf with pale grey fur shot with flecks of black stepped forward, her head bowed forward a little as she approached the alpha pair.

Harry allowed Xiang to approach, though he still looked nervous, and after giving him a cursory sniff, she bumped her muzzle against his affectionately. Harry perked up a little, and returned the gesture. The ice had broken, and slowly the other members of the pack began to file in to greet their new Alpha Bitch.

Fenrir watched as each pack member approached Harry, even Caomh (albeit reluctantly), and took their turn in greeting him. Once their turn was over, each wolf stepped back, forming a circle around the alpha pair, and after the last of the cubs had scampered up to Harry, all the wolves tilted their heads back in perfect sync, and howled their welcome.

 


	6. Turns

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Next update will be August 13th. Enjoy :)

Chapter Six – Turns

 

When Harry woke on the morning following the full moon, surrounded by his fellow pack members, he knew straightaway that the person at his back, the one embracing him so lovingly was Greyback.

After so long, Harry could easily recognize the man's scent, but that wasn't exactly reassuring. He squirmed experimentally, but Greyback merely pulled him closer, nuzzling the hollow of his throat in sleep, while he let out a sound that was closer to a purr than a growl. The action made Harry feel less like a person, and more like some sort of living teddy bear. He squirmed again, but the movement made no difference in Greyback's hold on him. He nipped at Harry's exposed flesh, and Harry shivered in response to the touch.

The rough palm of Greyback's right hand pressed against Harry's abdomen, and slowly it began to inch downward towards his groin. Harry bit the inside of his cheek in an effort to keep his fear in check (though it did little to help), and his breath hitched when Greyback began to idly stroke his flaccid cock.

At first, Harry was too stunned by Greyback's actions to do more than freeze in place, amazed that he'd do such a thing with his entire pack around him—which included his own children.

When Harry’s cock gave a sudden interested twitch to Greyback’s expert ministrations, it jolted Harry back to reality and he wrenched himself out of the alpha’s hold. Harry wasn't certain if it was of his own strength or because Greyback had _let_ him go, but he didn't give himself time to think on it as he vaulted over the stirring pack members and bolted for the cabins.

Shaking violently, Harry did not allow himself to pause as he tugged on some fresh clothes before he sat back against one of the bare walls of the cabin to try and work out what had just happened. He didn't dare sit on the bed or the benches near the fire pit—those places Harry was certain Greyback would see as an invitation, which was the _last_ thing that he wanted right now.

_I reacted to his touch,_ Harry thought, his eyes wide and panicked, _this can't be me. I can't...want this. Or him. He's a murderer, a kidnapper, he hurt Bill, and turned Remus, and who knows how many more. If I give in to him, I'm nothing more than a traitor._

The creaking of the front door opening snapped Harry from his thoughts, and even before the intruder had crossed the threshold, Harry could sense that it was Greyback. He swallowed his nervousness and kept still, unwilling to skitter farther away from the werewolf and show his fear.

“I thought you might be in here,” Greyback rumbled, his tone neutral, but despite that, Harry was certain that he could hear a note of amusement in his voice. He continued to speak as he strode over to the end of the bed where his clean clothes were kept, and tugged on a pair of sturdy jeans before he turned back to Harry and continued. “Even when you're running _from_ me, you are still comforted by my scent, regardless whether you're aware of it or not.”

“That's not it,” Harry replied, his eyes narrowing at the older man, “this is the only place that I'm not likely to be disturbed...except by you.”

Harry listened to the soft shuffle of his heavy footfalls across the hard-packed dirt, and when Greyback crouched down in front of him, Harry instantly recoiled. His back pressed harder into the cabin's wall, and his breath hitched, but Greyback did not move away.

“You accepted me as your mate quite readily last night,” he murmured as he rested his large hands on the sides of Harry's knees and snaked them along his thighs and towards his hips. “What is it that you're so afraid of, hm?” he inched closer, and Harry could feel Greyback's breath on his cheek. “Is it that if you accept me...you'll actually have to be _happy_? It's a feeling you're fairly unaccustomed to, from what I've heard.”

Greyback's hands stopped at Harry's hips. The alpha gripped him tightly, and slowly drew him forward. Entranced, Harry did not fight as the alpha pulled him flush against his chest, before falling back into a sitting position, with Harry more or less in his lap.

Greyback's mouth descended on the hollow of Harry's throat, and he shivered at the way his stubbly beard tickled his skin. Harry felt the reverberation of Greyback's chuckle run through him, and his breath hitched as Greyback traced the line of his neck with his tongue.

“N-no...” Harry protested, and shuddered when he felt those large hands slip under the hem of his shirt.

“Yes,” Greyback purred, “you're primed and ready, Harry, you just don't know it. Let go of your pesky morals, you want this, you know that you do...”

“No,” Harry repeated, panting hard as he shook his head. Despite his negation, he was trembling from how _good_ Greyback's hands felt on him.

“You want me, Harry,” Greyback said softly, and trailed one hand up Harry's chest, where he lightly tweaked one of his nipples, causing him to gasp sharply. “Don't deny it. I can feel it—hell I can _smell_ how turned on you are right now. Heat season starts in two months, and you _will_ want me.”

“I-I'd want spattergroit more,” Harry retorted, and Greyback chuckled.

“Oh, yes, very convincing,” he taunted, “try it again without the stammer.”

Harry glared at him, but it did nothing to dampen the self-satisfied smirk that rested upon the werewolf's face as he leant in again. Harry instinctively lurched back, but there was nowhere for him to go, given that he was trapped between the werewolf and the wall. Greyback reached out again, and Harry flinched when the werewolf closed a hand around his wrist.

Panic coursed through him, but instead of restraining him in some way, Greyback brought his hand down to his groin to rest over the raging hard-on that the alpha was currently sporting. Flushing a deep scarlet, Harry tried to pull away, but Greyback merely tensed his hold on him.

“Do you see what you do to me, little sub?” he purred, “ do you see how much I _want_ you?”

Harry blanched, and tugged on his wrist. This time Greyback let him go, and he tumbled out of the embrace and backed into the wall.

“I don't care how much you want me,” Harry said shakily, “I'll never want _you_.”

“We'll see about that,” Greyback replied with a small smirk as he stood fluidly and strode from the cabin.

 

Harry sat there for several long moments, breathing hard and shaking—but not from fear.

The moment his hand had brushed over that sizable bulge in the alpha's jeans, his inner wolf positively _preened_ at eliciting such a reaction from his mate—

— _no,_ Harry interrupted the thought with a rough shake of his head. _Not my mate. Greyback could_ never _be my mate._

Overwhelmed, Harry longed to go take a bath and think over everything, but to do so he would have to leave the cabin and face the others. He was in no mood to chat with a bunch of other werewolves about how _great_ and _wonderful_ Greyback was—he _wasn't_ wonderful—at least, not to Harry.

He was a murderer. He mauled Bill, and turned Remus, and ruined the lives of countless others. That was something that Harry needed to remember if he was to ever get out of this with his mind in tact.

_Then why do I feel like I can trust him?_

The thought was deeply unnerving, because no matter how many times Harry had tried to convince himself that _this was Greyback_ , the niggling sense of trust that had worked its way into Harry's mind and refused to leave. It left Harry feeling lost and alone, and nowhere near reassured by this sudden shift in his view of the infamous werewolf.

 

~*~

 

Neville sat across from his former professors with Ron and Hermione at his side, while the two of them voiced their proposal.

“What you are asking us to do might take months, Miss Granger,” McGonagall said while she surveyed her ex-students over her spectacles. “In fact, it would not be a stretch to say that it's impossible. Mr Potter could be anywhere, and pinpointing one soul in millions would take an enormous amount of precision. Added to that, if he's behind some sort of magical warding, there's every possibility that we will not be able to locate him.”

“But the Marauders—” Hermione began, but McGonagall was quick to cut her off.

“— _they_ created a map of a specific area, never something as big as this, and never focused on a single person,” McGonagall said, and Neville bowed his head in disappointment while his former Head of House continued to speak. “I'm sorry, Miss Granger, but I do not think that it can be done.”

Neville felt a crushing weight in his chest, like disappointment, but deeper. How were they supposed to find Harry now?

“Then what are we supposed to do?” Ron demanded, his voice angry and almost belligerent.

“Ronald Weasley!” Molly admonished from across the table, “you mind your tone!”

“Mum!” Ron protested, but then quickly turned his attention back to McGonagall. “I’m sorry, professor, but it just feels like we’re not doing enough to find Harry.”

“It is quite all right, Mr Weasley,” McGonagall said, her tone stiff, but understanding. “I understand how much you three wish to find your friend, but I am afraid that your proposed idea for locating him just isn’t practical.”

“What about Pig, then?” Neville asked, his voice a little small compared to his two friends, and he winced when all eyes at the table swivelled to him.

“I was under the impression that that did not work, correct?” Shacklebolt asked, and Neville nodded.

“It didn’t find him specifically, because there was too much magic in the air,” Neville explained. “Maybe it wasn’t just magic, but _warding_ magic? Maybe Pig found him, but couldn’t reach him?”

“Neville!” Hermione gasped, her eyes widening. “Oh, that’s brilliant! We can use Pig to map out the wards, then maybe have someone do reconnaissance on the area to determine if someone has him, or if he’s alone!”

“Professor?” Neville asked, turning his gaze back to McGonagall, “would that work?”

“I believe it would,” McGonagall replied with a warm smile. “Good thinking, Mr Longbottom. Now, draft a plan, and you can lead the charge on this.”

“Me?”

“Yes, you,” she replied. “It was your idea, after all.”

“It wouldn’t be fair for any one of us to take charge of it when it was your idea,” Hermione added. “And Ron and I will help you if you need it.”

The support of his friends and the rest of the Order was daunting to Neville, but oddly reassuring at the same time. They trusted _him_ to find Harry? They were using _his_ idea? It sounded almost ridiculous.

“All right,” Neville replied with a weak nod and a shaky laugh, “let’s do it.”

 

~*~

 

Remus woke the morning following the moon, and immediately he knew that something was wrong.

He was naked, as was to be expected on the morning following the moon, but strangely, he did not _feel_ naked. In an odd way it almost felt natural, despite the fact that he was still trapped in the back of the horrible van. He sat up a little as he tried to figure out why he felt both so right and yet so wrong, and the van's engine, which was making the floor vibrate slightly, tickled the pads of Remus’s paws uncomfortably.

Remus froze.

_Paws?_

Remus jumped up at once, and his claws skittered across the metal floor unpleasantly. He walked in a circle in an attempt to inspect himself, and even in the pitch-dark, he could see it clearly—he was still in his wolf form.

_Perhaps I just woke up early, maybe it's still night..._ Remus thought in a panic, but even as he did so, he turned to the back doors of the rickety old van, and he spotted a hairline crack of bright sunlight that was filtering inside.

Somehow, impossibly, he was still a wolf, despite the fact that it was now day.

Remus’s panic began to intensify, and at the same moment, he heard a cackle from the front seats of the vehicle.

“I think our passenger has just figured out that he's locked in 'is wolf skin!” he crowed, and let off another cackle.

“Can't let you wander around as a human!” called the other, his voice darkly amused and distinctly muffled, “there ain't no value in human werewolf skin!”

True panic began to set in as the words registered with Remus, and he let out a whine as he scrabbled at the doors of the van, but even with his added werewolf strength, they refused to give. He howled, but, predictably, no one came to his aid.

_I need to get out,_ Remus thought as he backed up a little, then rammed his shoulder against the doors. _I need to find Dora, or the Order, they'll put me right..._

“Oh, bloody hell, Geoff, pull over, he's gonna make a right mess of the back of the van...”

The van jerked to an abrupt stop, and Remus's paws skidded across the smooth metal, and he bumped heavily against the side of the van. In the brief moment it took him to get his bearings, the back doors of the van were thrown open, and he was blinded by the sun as a voice cried, _“Impedimentia!_ ”

Remus felt his limbs freeze, but being what he was, spells did not work on him nearly as well as on a regular human, and at once he felt the effects beginning to subside. His captors seemed to know this, and immediately, he felt another Impediment Jinx hit him.

“Now, hold still, wolfie...” trilled the shorter one, and Remus remembered that he was the one called Geoff. He was brandishing a wire muzzle, and Remus could do nothing but stare in horror as the poacher fit it into place, then flicked his wand at Remus's paws. His ankles snapped together and were instantly bound with thick rope, and Remus fell hard on his side, still frozen and unable to even try and stop the fall.

“Come on,” said Geoff to his partner as they slammed the doors again, enveloping Remus in darkness, “we got a lot of ground to cover before we get back to the factory...”

As the engine ignited again, Remus felt the jinx lift, and he let out a whine of terror. No one knew where he was, and, likely, no one even knew he was _alive._ How on earth was he supposed to escape with his life?

His whine was answered with another cruel, mocking laugh, and Remus’s head flopped against the uncomfortable metal floor while he tried to come up with some sort of means of escape, but no ideas came to him.

 

~*~

 

Fenrir just barely managed to not slam the cabin door shut on his way out, and with his teeth gritted, he stormed away and over to the bathing area, but skipped the hot baths and instead opted for the icy cold of the river. He wasn’t in the mood to relax, but a transformation under the moon always left his skin feeling twitchy, and bathing always helped to calm him.

The cold of the rushing river wilted his arousal effectively, but it did not alleviate his frustration at his little mate. Harry _wanted_ him, Fenrir could see it, clear as day, so _why_ was he fighting it so damn hard?

No answers came to him, and he left the bath quickly, only slightly less annoyed than when he'd arrived. He could see his packmates skirting around him nervously, and he supposed that his frustration must be showing on his face, for usually they never looked so nervous around him.

Fenrir took breakfast early, given that no one else was permitted to eat until he did, despite the fact that he did not feel hungry in the slightest. Predictably, Harry did not come out to eat, and once again, Fenrir ground his teeth in frustration.

“Still having trouble, Alpha?” a sudden voice said, and Fenrir glanced up to see Sheehan grinning down at him. Fenrir grunted.

“I may as well have bound myself to a stale old bitch for all the response I get,” Fenrir grumbled as he stabbed at a hunk of meat sullenly, “I can _see_ that he wants me, his wolf accepted me last night, so why the hell is he still fighting it so damn hard?”

“He was raised by wizards,” Sheehan reminded him as he sat down next to his father. “Likely, he was raised on all those myths about you. Why not tell him about Father? That might calm his worries a bit.”

“That—that is not up for discussion,” Fenrir growled, but his son appeared undeterred. “I lost your father a long time ago, I'm not keen to re-open old wounds.”

“I know you aren't, Alpha,” Sheehan said in a soft and consoling voice that did nothing but make Fenrir grit his teeth in anger—he did _not_ need to be mollycoddled by his own son. “but Harry is young, a new wolf, he knows no one out here, and, most importantly, he doesn't know _you_. He is alone and isolated, which is not healthy for anyone. I know you don't like to talk about what happened to Father, but it might be a good way to get Harry to understand you better, or let you in. What have you got to lose?”

“Besides my pride?”

“So you'd rather salvage your pride than help your mate get more comfortable here...is that it?” Sheehan asked as he arched a brow at his father, and Greyback let out a low, frustrated growl.

“When did you get so bloody wise?”

“About the time you were too busy protecting us from the Dark Lord to be around all that much,” Sheehan replied with a small smirk, and gave his father a pointed nudge with his elbow. “Now go. Anaïs and I will keep an eye on things. Your mate needs you.”

Grumbling under his breath about pushy children, Fenrir got up, fetched a fresh bowl of food for Harry, then stalked back towards the cabins.

 


	7. Perception Shift

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Next update will be August 27th. Enjoy!  
>  **Content Warning: Implied/Referenced Character Death (Original Characters), and Implied/Referenced Child Death.**

Chapter Seven – Perception Shift

 

Harry had spent his morning in the cabin as he struggled to work out what had happened the night before, as well as this morning. Unfortunately, all of his attempts to sort it out had left him frustrated, uneasy, and terribly lonely.

Under normal circumstances, Harry was able to at least draw up mental versions of his friends in his mind and imagine what sort of advice they might offer, but this time he felt at a complete loss for how they might react to his present situation.

At the same time, part of him was quite certain that they'd be disgusted by Harry being bound to such an infamous man, and he shuddered to think of what might happen to his already fragile state of mind if they were to openly reject him.

Harry drew his knees to his chest, and heaved a soft sigh.

_I wish Ron and Hermione were here,_ Harry thought miserably, despite his fears. _Even if they had no advice for me, it'd be nice to have someone to talk to..._

As if on cue, the cabin door was thrown open and Harry jumped in surprise as Greyback appeared in the doorway, holding a bowl of hot food in one of his hands, and his face set in an unreadable expression as he stared at Harry.

Unwilling to appear weak, Harry held his ground as he watched the alpha approach, despite that fact that all he wanted to do was back away from the huge, ferocious man. As he got closer, Harry could not help but notice that Greyback was carrying a reluctant, apprehensive look in his eye. This struck Harry as odd, given that up until now, Greyback had always appeared as nothing but confident in everything he did. Seeing him as less than that was humanizing, in a strange way—not that he'd ever tell Greyback that.

“Here,” Greyback grunted as he forced the bowl into Harry’s hands. “Eat. You didn't come out for breakfast again.”

“Thanks,” Harry mumbled, but the reluctant show of gratitude did not seem to do anything to improve the older man’s mood.

“You know, one of these days you're going to need to stop being such a bloody princess and join us at mealtimes—I'm not in the business of hand-feeding my pack members.”

“I'm not being a princess,” Harry growled, and glared at Greyback. “I'm just...overwhelmed. I don't want to be here, I want to go home, I want to see my friends, and properly meet my godson now that the dust is beginning to settle, but then I remember I _can't_ because everyone thinks I'm a traitor. I'm _stuck_ , and I hate it.”

He stabbed at the food sullenly. The moment that Harry had—foolishly—taken his eyes off Greyback, the alpha moved to sit next to him, and then proceeded to drag Harry into his lap. He yelped as he dropped the bowl, miraculously not spilling anything in the process as he squirmed, attempting to get out of the embrace, only to have Greyback clamp an arm around his waist in a vice-like grip.

“Would you _calm down_?” he snarled, “I'm not going to ravish you. Just _eat_.”

“Let me go,” Harry snapped, ignoring the command, and squirmed again. “I mean it, Greyback, _let me go_.”

“And I said, _calm down_ ,” Greyback countered, and shifted again to lean forward and tickle the hollow of Harry's throat with his lips. “I'm not going to hurt you, you ridiculous little sub. Just shut up, eat, and _relax_.”

Harry shuddered under the gentle touch, and squirmed experimentally one last time, but when Greyback still did not release him, he momentarily gave up and reluctantly picked up the bowl of food. He went back to eating the meal he had been brought, not speaking, while he paid careful attention to the feeling of Greyback’s arm around him, waiting for it to slacken, even slightly, so that he could escape.

As he ate, Greyback continued to hold him and touch him. Harry hated it, not because it made his skin crawl, but because it felt so damnably _good_. He could feel his werewolf instincts positively _screaming_ at him to reciprocate or at least _accept_ the touches, but his pride was still the stronger force in his mind, and he managed to keep himself still as he glared down at his meat and potatoes, the strangest mixture of longing and shame bubbling up inside him as he sat there.

“I had a mate, as you know,” Greyback said suddenly, the statement seemingly out of nowhere. Harry blinked, and opened his mouth to respond, but Greyback continued before Harry could say a word. “A sub named Lukas. He was the father of all nine of my children.

“During the Dark Lord's first reign of power over Wizard Britain, he wanted the strength of the werewolves on his side,” Greyback continued, and his voice had dropped in volume. Harry could hear the pain in it, even before his arms had tensed around Harry, seemingly unconsciously, as though he needed to touch his current mate in order to stay grounded, and not lose himself in memories. “I was and still am the most powerful werewolf in the British Isles, but I had no interest in wizarding politics, and I refused. He retaliated by killing my mate, and three of my children—Daibheid, Flynn, and Faoiltiarna. Daibheid had not been born yet, Lukas was still pregnant with him, he was to be our tenth. Flynn was twenty-one, and Faoiltiarna was twenty-five; they were my two eldest at the time. I lost them all because I defied the Dark Lord. Lukas and I had been together for thirty-five years.”

“Why—why are you telling me this?” Harry asked softly, and set aside the food bowl, his appetite suddenly gone. He tried to turn and look at the older man, but Greyback’s arm was still too tight around his waist, and he couldn’t move. Greyback seemed to sense what he wanted to do, and relaxed his hold enough for Harry to turn and look at him, though Greyback would not meet his gaze.

“To maybe get you to understand that a lot of the wrongs that I have done were not because I was willing,” Greyback replied in a hollow tone of voice. “The Dark Lord threatened the safety of my pack—my _family_. Do not tell me that you would not do whatever it took to keep your family safe, I _know_ that you would. You're the first sub I've taken in twenty years, Harry. I took you for selfish reasons—I _wanted_ you. I could smell your power and potential. I want to see a delicious little thing like you swollen with my cubs after mating season passes. _But_ I am no rapist. I will take you when you return my affections—and you _will_. It's only a matter of time before you are unable to hold yourself back any longer.”

As Greyback spoke, his hands trailed from Harry's waist, across his thighs, and stopped just shy of his groin. Harry shivered, and he felt himself flush a deep scarlet at the alpha's words. Not from shame, but instead from how _enticing_ the mental images were to the new werewolf parts of his mind.

Harry clenched his eyes shut and shook his head.

_No, no...he's messing with my head, playing on these instincts that I can't control..._

Closing his eyes seemed to be something of a bad idea as he felt Greyback's hot breath tickle his throat, and his eyes flew open. The alpha smirked at him, and tugged him closer.

“You feel it, don't you?” he purred, “that pull...that _need_ to please me...”

“No...” Harry whimpered as he tried to jerk back, but Greyback merely tensed his hold on him.

“Yes,” he purred, “don't fight it, Harry, just _give in_. Submissive werewolves are natural-born caregivers, it's in their blood. Just accept it...”

“N-no, I'm not your—your _bitch..._ I don't—don't want this...”

“You will,” Greyback replied in the same low tone, and leant in, so close that Harry could feel the alpha's breath on his cheek, and he tensed, but miraculously, Greyback let him go.

Harry bowed forward as the alpha stood up, his heart racing in his panic at Greyback's unnerving fluctuation between his apparent attempt at _sharing_ , before reverting back to his usual attitude. The alpha appeared caught between frustration and longing, clearly wholly unused to being so consistently rejected by someone.

“I'll _never_ want you,” Harry snarled, and shot the werewolf a nasty glare. “Just give it up. Let me go home.”

“You _are_ home,” Greyback snapped, “the sooner you get that through your thick skull, the happier you'll be.”

“This isn't my home, it's my _prison._ Greyback, please, I just—I want to go home and try to salvage what life I have left,” Harry pleaded, and winced when his voice began to crack. “I've lost so much, why would you take my family from me, too?”

“You have a family here,” Greyback countered, “a family who _wants_ to get to know you, only you won't let them. You've only spoken to other subs when you absolutely have to, and spend most of your time hidden away and isolated. You have no one to blame for your loneliness but yourself. Your old family is dead to you. They will see you as nothing but an animal—a _monster._ Just remember that.”

Greyback stormed over to the doors, but paused with his hand on the frame, and turned back to Harry.

“This is the last meal I'm bringing to you, Harry. If you want to eat, you'll join us at mealtimes. I'm done mollycoddling someone who throws my hospitality back in my face.”

Greyback slammed the door behind him, and Harry was left in peace.

 

Appetite completely gone, Harry abandoned the offered food and moved over to the bed where he curled up and let out a soft, despondent sigh.

_Why did he tell me that story about his former...lover? Husband? Birth...Father to his children?_

Harry could not work out whether it had been a genuine attempt to let Harry in, or if it was merely another manipulating tactic to get Harry to give him what he wanted.

Harry shivered.

Greyback scared him. Harry wasn't ashamed to admit such a thing—it seemed more foolish _not_ to. He would fluctuate moods so quickly that Harry never knew what to expect, and worst of all, his sexual assaults did not feel like assaults—at least, not any kind that Harry had heard of.

Because Harry loved every minute of it.

He doubted he'd ever be willing to admit it—much like he doubted whether he'd ever view this place as _home_ , but it did not change the fact that despite his continued verbal protests, his body practically _sang_ when Greyback chose to touch him.

But it was wrong, this Harry knew.

Greyback was a murderer—he killed so many during the war, and to feel anything but contempt for him was inconceivable.

_So why do I want to make Greyback come back and finish what he's started?_ Harry wondered in a nervous panic, _is this me, or some kind of prisoner sickness thing, or is it those sodding_ sub instincts _that he keeps talking about? I have no idea anymore._

Harry hugged the pillow to his chest, and inhaled. The masculine musk that clung to it made Harry shiver with delight, and he felt himself begin to calm. He buried his face farther in the pillow, and he felt his muscles sag as he relaxed, too exhausted by the awkward conversation with Greyback to question his current actions, or what they might mean.

Curled up around the pillow, Harry was quick to fall back to sleep.

 

~*~

 

Fenrir stood at the window of his cabin, and he watched his mate cling to his pillow as he fell back to sleep. All the stress had clearly exhausted him, though Fenrir could not help but preen at how his scent still consistently put his mate at ease, even when nothing else did.

And with August fast approaching, it looked as though he'd have a litter of pups by Christmas if things continued to improve.

“Alpha?” a voice said, drawing him from his thoughts. He scowled as he turned to one of his sentries, an older man named Ivan, and he immediately bowed his head respectfully when Fenrir focused his gaze on him.

“What is it?”

“Apologies for interrupting your courting, Alpha, but I thought you should know—there have been some strange sightings around the outskirts of the territory, though none of us can tell if it's benign or not—a tiny owl with some sort of strange contraption attached to its leg. It looked like muggle technology, but it was most certainly a Post Owl, so we did not let it through. Reed, he was muggleborn, said it looked like a research tracking device—he said that muggles used it to study different sorts of creatures, and map their flight patterns and things. We suspect that someone is trying to locate your mate.”

Ivan said all of this very fast, as though terribly self-conscious about using up too much of his leader's time. His gaze was focused determinedly on the ground, and his expression strained, as though he expected Fenrir to hit him for bringing him bad news.

“That is likely, considering that he is still a traitor in the eyes of the wizarding world,” Fenrir replied gruffly. “I suspect it's either a Ministry ploy to catch him and arrest him, or it's his friends trying to find him—they likely think that I've kidnapped him for some sort of terrible plot.”

“As wizards, would they really never suspect that you saved him from a life on the run?” Ivan asked nervously, and Fenrir could not help but chuckle at that—born werewolves could be so endearingly naïve at times.

“No, that would never occur to them,” Fenrir replied. “Precious few will ever see us as more than mindless beasts. Have those with wands strengthen the warding, and have Siobhan add her own magic to it. Werewolf warding is as strong as steel, and my daughter is the most practised out of you lot.”

“Yes, Alpha.” Ivan bowed his head and scurried away like a frightened squirrel, while Fenrir cast another glance towards the window. Harry was still sound asleep, and he could feel his skin humming in his deep desire to go to him.

_But my presence will still not be celebrated, even if he is comforted by the scent of his mate. He doesn't understand that yet. He's still young, and as awkward and skittish as a fawn._

Trusting that his children could keep the pack in line, Fenrir silently returned to the cabin. He turned the knob soundlessly, and slipped back inside.

Harry did not stir, and Fenrir smiled inwardly as he forced the change, a solid black wolf replacing his human form, and he padded over to where his mate slept. He climbed onto the bed and curled up around him, his large head coming to rest across Harry's waist gently.

The sub sighed with contentment, and immediately abandoned the pillow he'd been clutching in favour of burrowing deeper into the warm wolf fur. Fenrir huffed with silent amusement, certain that when Harry woke he would balk at finding himself like this, but for the moment, his sleepy contentment was enough for Fenrir, and he wrapped himself more securely around his mate, warming and protecting him as he slept on.

_Foolish boy,_ Fenrir thought as he let out a soft laugh, while Harry's fingers twined through his fur unconsciously. _You want me, I can sense it—why do you insist on fighting so hard against something that would bring you joy? I can give you everything—home, family, love. Why do you throw it back in my face like spoiled meat? Is it that you do not recognize it for what it is? Do you still only see me as the monster who turned you and kidnapped you?_

_Humans really are foolish creatures._

 

~*~

 

Harry woke entwined in warmth.

His newfound werewolf senses told him that he was in no danger. On the contrary, he was as safe as safe could be. Harry knew instinctually that he did not need to move, or protest, for he was protected where he was. He could rest and relax; here, there was no danger.

Which in reality meant that something was _very_ wrong, considering Harry could not recall any time in recent history where he was _ever_ out of danger.

Harry blinked bemusedly, his brain still waking up and not really registering what he was seeing, though the situation felt almost painfully familiar. It was dark outside, but it was still early—Harry could hear voices in the distance that could only belong to the other members of the pack, though it was late enough that he heard no children’s voices intermingled with them.

It took another moment for his brain to fully wake, and when it did, he gasped sharply and hastily wiggled away from the enormous black wolf. In his haste, he hadn't been watching where he was going, and almost careened directly into one of the cabin walls, skidding to a halt just in time, before he toppled to the ground in a heap.

The wolf, far from appearing upset at his sudden waking, lifted his head and huffed, but otherwise did not move. Harry stared back at him, his coat sleek and shiny with no hint of grey, unlike his human form where his entire head was a uniform silver. He narrowed his ice-blue eyes at Harry, and huffed again. Harry could not work out whether he was angry or not with Harry's reaction, but at that same moment the strangest compulsion washed over him, and for the first time in years, he indulged it.

Harry broke down, and cried.

He wept hard, ugly tears streaking his cheeks, his nose running, and he positively howled with anguish. He wasn't certain what had sparked it, nor what he was crying for. There were so many things he'd lost in recent years, it was hard to work out exactly who or what he was crying for. All he knew for certain was that he could no longer hold the emotion in as it burst from him, like a rushing river through a broken dam.

Warm arms encircled Harry's waist as he continued to cry. They were thick, hard with muscle, but deeply comforting. They were paired with a gruff, “oh, come here,” and in that particular moment, Harry did not care who was offering him comfort—it could have been Voldemort himself, and he would have accepted it. All Harry knew was that he needed it, and at the same moment Fenrir Greyback was there, embracing him and rubbing his back gently, while he made soft hushing sounds as he tried to help Harry calm down.

Harry tried to muster up some kind of anger or disgust at himself or the alpha, but he could only weep into his mate's shoulder and cling to him, hiccoughing weakly as he tried to get a handle on his raging emotions. Fenrir did not speak, but held him and rocked him, a large hand at his back as he continued to weep into the crook of the alpha's neck, sniffling weakly as Fenrir rubbed his back in hard, sure strokes, but never painful.

_He makes me feel safe,_ Harry thought as he cried, _how does he do that? I should hate him, but I can't._

“I know what you want, Harry,” Fenrir murmured softly, the impatient bite gone from his voice as he spoke. “I know you want to go to your human home, see your human family, and rebuild your life with someone other than me. However, it is not what you _need_. I did not bring you here to trap you, or imprison you. Here, you are safe. It is true, I bit you without prior consent, but had I not you would be running for the rest of your life. Because of me, you now have a home and a family. When the dust settles and it is no longer so dangerous for you to venture beyond our borders, I would have no protests in escorting you to see your humans, but for the moment is too dangerous, and I will not lose you simply to placate your ego.”

Harry sniffled again as he listened to Fenrir speak, and his arms tensed around the alpha, not quite willing to let him go yet. The large hand stopped at the small of Harry's back and tugged him closer.

“I am not...I'm not good with opening myself up to people, Harry,” Fenrir murmured softly, “but I have done so for you. I do not expect miracles; I do not expect you to fall into my arms and let me do what I like with you. What I _would_ like is a chance. That is all.”

“A...a chance?” Harry asked, and shifted a little to look up at the alpha. His eyes felt wet, and as he blinked, another tear slipped from them, and tricked down his cheek. Harry moved to hide his tears, but Fenrir was too fast for him, and caught the tear with his thumb, brushing it away without comment.

“Yes,” he replied, “a _chance_. You have wept in front of me, something, I gather, you do not do often. I can feel that you want to trust me. I am not the monster that you think I am, Harry.”

Still sniffling feebly, Harry shifted and pressed his cheek to Fenrir's chest, and immediately he tensed his arms around him, holding Harry in a close, secure embrace.

Harry did not speak, uncertain what he could say under the circumstances, and simply allowed himself to be held.

 


	8. Stories

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Next update will be September 10th. Enjoy!

Chapter Eight – Stories

To Harry’s surprise, it began slowly, awkwardly—but without a doubt, it had _begun_.

Harry slept curled up in Fenrir's arms every night, and welcomed the protection his mate’s strength provided him. He would press his cheek to the hard expanse of his chest, and let out a tiny, blissful sigh. He had never in his life felt so perfectly safe as he did in those moments, and though Fenrir's attitude by and large had not changed—he was still the same gruff man that he had always been, but something still felt different. It was distinct, like the odour of just-ripened fruit, no longer sour, but sweet and enticing. Harry _wanted_ to be near him, wanted the comfort his mate provided, wanted his warmth.

In short, Harry simply _wanted_ him.

He no longer felt compelled to fight it, either. It felt different to what Harry supposed Stockholm Syndrome might be like—Fenrir had kidnapped him, taken him, so to speak, but Harry did not feel _trapped_ by him. Regardless what he'd said, he'd never truly felt like a prisoner. He'd had ways to escape, if he was so inclined, but he'd never tried. Harry wasn't certain if this was because of the rogues, or his sudden infamy, or something else, but instinctively, he had known that _this_ was truly where he belonged.

 

One afternoon, during the tail end of Harry’s usual afternoon nap, a low, approving growl hummed through the air like a purr, drawing Harry from sleep. A heavy hand fell to Harry's groin, and patted blindly at him as he lay there.

“ _Mine..._ ” Fenrir rumbled under his breath, his tone almost sluggish, as though he was half asleep. “ _Mate...Mine..._ ”

Harry's stomach flip-flopped nervously at the words, but the wolf parts of his mind positively _preened_ at the sound of them. He glanced up with bleary eyes, and his breath caught when he spotted one single blue iris peering down at him.

_He wasn't asleep._

Harry bit his lip, his mind fogged up by confusion, and shuddered as Fenrir palmed at Harry's clothed cock again.

“Something wrong, baby?” Fenrir purred, the pet name making Harry's face flood with colour. “You have that constipated look on your face again, when I thought I'd finally gotten rid of all your silly human morals.”

“Thought you were...were... _oh_.” Harry groaned as Fenrir's large, rough hand slipped under the waistband of his underwear, and took hold of his growing erection.

“Thought I was...?” Fenrir queried as he tugged on Harry's cock gently, his large thumb brushing over the tip before he moved to stroke it idly, like he was doing nothing more strenuous than petting a cat.

“A-asleep,” Harry panted, whining as he arched into the contact. “T-thought you were asleep...”

Fenrir chuckled, and tugged Harry flush against his chest, one hand still on his cock while he nipped at the shell of his ear.

“Silly little sub...” he purred, his voice rumbling with approval, “why would I sleep when making you all pink and wriggling is a much better way to spend my time? Mating season is almost here, as you recall, and at this time of year you smell so _delectable_...are you just nervous about me filling your belly?”

Fenrir ghosted his open palm over Harry's flat abdomen, and Harry sucked it in a little as Fenrir inadvertently tickled him.

“A bit,” Harry replied honestly as he turned to snuggle into Fenrir's chest, who seemed to start slightly at the move. “But even though I probably shouldn't...I want it. Is that bad?”

“Why do you think you shouldn't?”

“I'm basically signing up to be an...er... _teen mom._ ” Harry wrinkled his nose, and Fenrir chuckled warmly.

“Just because it is possible for me to pup you, doesn't mean it will happen this cycle,” Fenrir said while he gave Harry's cock a small squeeze, making the sub moan again. “Like any other being that can carry young, it requires the perfect storm, so to speak, for it to work. That doesn't mean I will not do my best to pup you, however. It has been a long time indeed since I've had my own young cubs running about...”

Fenrir squeezed his cock again, making Harry whimper. He tugged down the front of Harry’s pants, popping out his aching erection before he closed his rough hand around it again, making Harry arch into the touch. Harry trembled, whimpering as his hips jerked forward, and he heard his mate chuckle, clearly pleased with the enthusiastic response.

“Oh, I love how little it takes to turn you into putty in my hands...” Fenrir purred as he nipped at Harry's throat, “you just _love_ it, my little mate...”

Harry groaned again, panting sharply as the alpha squeezed his cock again, stroking it roughly and making Harry shudder with burning need.

“Want...Need...God, Fenrir, _please!_ ”

“Please _what_ , pet?”

“F-fuck me!” Harry cried as his neck arched and he came much more suddenly than he had expected,, his seed splattering over Fenrir's hand and his own stomach, while Fenrir bit down on the side of his throat, bruising the golden skin and marking him, which made Harry groan again in blinding pleasure.

As Harry came down from the emotional high of his orgasm, Fenrir pushed him onto his back and lapped up his cum, leaving cooling streaks of saliva on Harry's skin and making him shiver again. He did not miss the hot, heavy erection that Fenrir was sporting, and Harry felt his face flood with colour at the sight of it. Fenrir noticed at once, and chuckled warmly.

“Like what you see?” he teased, and Harry bit his lip. Despite his fatigue, he could already feel his arousal beginning to reassert itself, though it seemed to be all in his mind, as he was still far too exhausted to get hard again.

Not yet, anyway.

Harry watched, transfixed, as Fenrir pressed his forearms into the furs on either side of Harry's head, he spread his legs, digging his knees in on either side of Harry’s hips, and slowly he lowered himself down until his cock was level with Harry's flaccid one, and he rotated his hips, grinding the two organs together.

Harry hissed as his back arched, his eyes screwing shut from how blindingly sensitive his cock still felt, but immediately one of Fenrir's hands moved to grip his chin, and Harry's eyes snapped back open.

“No,” Fenrir growled, “you will not take your eyes off me.”

“M-M...Mate...” Harry shuddered, the word choking its way out of his throat as he tried to draw out his burning _need_ for Fenrir, but the way he was rutting against Harry was too much, and so soon after his first orgasm, he could not hold himself back, and cried out as he came again, this time with his mate, and their seed mixed together upon their bellies.

“Good boy,” Fenrir panted as he leant in to lick a bead of sweat from Harry's cheek, and smoothed a hand across Harry’s belly, cleaning away the cum with his own brand of magic. “All ripe and ready for the season...”

“I...I still don't really understand what's going to happen,” Harry murmured, shivering a little as Fenrir's nose replaced his tongue, while his hand trailed along his flat stomach in silent promise. “I mean...it's breeding season just for the sub males, but what does that mean?”

 

~*~

 

Fenrir smirked to himself as he smelled the sweetness of his mate—his innocence, his spent orgasm that still clung to his skin, his sweat—but most of all, he brimmed with quiet joy at the words his mate spoke—he was _asking_ about their lives. He _wanted_ to know.

It took the alpha male a moment to calm himself enough to answer. As he did so, he drew his mate closer and inhaled, smelling the readiness upon his skin, like nearly-ripened fruit. He was not ovulating yet, but he was very close. It was only a matter of time now.

“No one knows precisely how the sub males and dominant females came about,” Fenrir began, “but the legend tells us that many centuries ago, the wizards tried to eradicate us by rounding up every werewolf in existence, and separated them by sex. They placed the males on one island, and the females upon another island on the other side of the earth. The wizards believed that we would all die out, and they would be free of the lycanthropic curse forever.”

Fenrir paused, his lip curling in disgust at the idea of werewolves as a curse. Harry, surprisingly, did not interrupt, and when he glanced down, he saw that his little mate was completely enthralled with the tale. Unwilling to break the spell, he continued.

“Many years passed with no change,” Fenrir said, “the werewolves grew accustomed to their lives after many failed attempts at escaping—wizards stood sentry over the isles, and had infested the sea that surrounded them with sharks, sea serpents, and other beasts in order to stop the werewolves from escaping. But on the hundredth full moon, something changed.”

“What happened?” Harry asked, his head cocked to the side like a curious pup, and Fenrir swallowed his pleasure behind a blank mask as he continued the story.

“They say that the moon was blotted out with clouds black as charcoal, and red lightning burst from the sky, killing the sentry wizards, and dispersing their hoard of beasts. Great waves rose up from the ocean's depths, and shrouded the werewolf isles in great plumes of water. There, half the male werewolves were blessed with secondary sex organs—a womb—and half of the females upon the other island were gifted with internal testicles and a sheathed penis. In short, the ability to procreate with their own sex.

“Ever since, the werewolves have had two breeding seasons—one for sub males, and one for sub females,” Fenrir finished. “Though the legend tells us that the gods intervened to save the werewolves from extinction, many others believe that it was evolution, and the secondary sex characteristics came about from an imbalance in numbers between the male and female of the species, but no one knows for certain.”

“Wow,” Harry breathed, his eyes as wide as any wolf cub who had been told of the legend of the subs before. “And just werewolves can do this...have the pregnant males, I mean?”

“Veela can, or so I have heard,” Fenrir replied, “and certain subspecies of nymph and centaur. It is not as uncommon as wizards think. After centuries upon centuries of wizards imposing their will on other sentient creatures, many have developed ways of ensuring that their species continues.”

“It's so hard to believe,” Harry said, glancing down at his stomach, his expression pinched and thoughtful, and to Fenrir's shock, Harry moved to rest a hand over Fenrir's, startling the alpha slightly.

“What exactly are you doing, Harry?” he asked, and the sub refocused his gaze on his mate, blinking a little as though in confusion.

“I'm holding your hand,” he said simply as he readjusted his grip until his fingers were threaded with Fenrir's. “What does it look like I'm doing?”

“I know _what_ you're doing,” Fenrir retorted gruffly, “I just don't understand _why_ you're doing it.”

“Isn't that what mates are supposed to do?” Harry asked curiously, “you know... _like_ each other?”

 

~*~

 

“I don't really care if you like me, I only care that you let me pup you,” Fenrir grunted, and Harry jerked up with an indignant cry.

“How can you _say_ that?” he demanded angrily, “do you even know what you sound like? _I only care about the sex, I don't care if we even like each other_ ,” Harry grunted out in an imitation of Fenrir's voice. “What sort of bollocks is _that_? I'm supposed to be your mate, not your fucking baby factory.”

“That's not how I meant it,” Fenrir replied, his eyes a little wide, but Harry jumped in before he could continue.

“Then how _did_ you mean it?” Harry shot back, “from here, it just sounds as I'm nothing more than your...your... _whore_.”

“You are _no_ such thing!” the alpha retorted. “You're my mate!”

“Then why can't you _act_ like it?” Harry yelled. “Are acts of kindness _that_ fucking foreign to you? Why can't you give me comfort as well as incredible orgasms?”

“Do you have _any_ fucking idea how long it's been since I've even _had_ a mate?” Fenrir demanded angrily, and to Harry’s overwhelming shock, he heard the alpha’s voice crack. “Have you _any_ fucking idea...how...how... _fuck_.”

Fenrir let out another snarl of anger, and grabbed his jeans off the floor of the cabin and yanked them on hastily before he stormed out, leaving Harry behind.

 

Harry sat on the bed, his stomach churning with guilt as he stared at the empty space so recently occupied by his so-called _mate_. His mind was caught between anger at Fenrir for what the great brute had said, and anguish for what he had implied.

“ _Do you have any fucking idea how long it's been since I've even had a mate?”_

Harry frowned and drew his knees to his chest. How could he have been so _stupid_ as to forget that?

“ _Now_ what do I do?” Harry wondered aloud. “If I apologize to his face, he'll probably think I'm patronizing him or something...”

With a small sigh, Harry got up and pulled on some clothing, then ventured out of the cabin and into the main area of the territory.

He spotted Shannon with the kids a little way’s away from where most of the others were taking lunch, and he seemed to be telling them some sort of story. The little dark-skinned girl on his knee, Ellette, he knew to be one of the sub's daughters, and her older sister, Ophelia, was sitting a little farther back, her mouth open and eyes wide as she, like all the other kids, listened to Shannon’s story in complete thrall. As Harry got closer, Shannon's voice filtered back to his ears.

 

“— _Days, weeks, months, years_

_Afterwards, when both were wives_

_With children of their own;_

_Their mother-hearts beset with fears,_

_Their lives bound up in tender lives;_

_Laura would call the little ones_

_And tell them of her early prime,_

_Those pleasant days long gone_

_Of not-returning time:_

_Would talk about the haunted glen,_

_The wicked, quaint fruit-merchant men,_

_Their fruits like honey to the throat_

_But poison in the blood;_

_(Men sell not such in any town):_

_Would tell them how her sister stood_

_In deadly peril to do her good,_

_And win the fiery antidote:_

_Then joining hands to little hands_

_Would bid them cling together,_

“ _For there is no friend like a sister_

_In calm or stormy weather;_

_To cheer one on the tedious way,_

_To fetch one if one goes astray,_

_To lift one if one totters down,_

_To strengthen whilst one stands.””_

 

A resounding round of applause followed as Shannon finished, little Ellette jumping from his lap as she ran for her sister, while the sub stood and bowed, the smile never fading from his face as he did so.

“Impressive,” Harry offered when he got closer, and all the little heads of the children whirled around to gaze at him. “How long did you have to practice before you memorized all that?”

“Too long,” Shannon replied with a small chuckle. “But Dustin didn't believe I could do it, so of course I _had_ to prove him wrong.”

“Of course,” Harry said as he laughed weakly, and stopped nearer to his fellow sub. “Er...could I talk to you? Alone?”

“Alpha Harry!” one of the children piped before Shannon could answer, and Harry glanced down to see Xiang's little granddaughter, Ling, hanging off his leg. “Would you tell us a story? _Please?_ ”

Harry glanced to Shannon, who shrugged at him helplessly while the other children began to chant their agreement with Ling.

“You better do it,” Shannon said with a short laugh, “then we can have a chat.”

“All right, all right,” Harry said as he moved from Shannon, and over to the log bench the older sub had been using. Ling climbed into his lap eagerly, while the other children all shuffled forward, getting as close to their Alpha Bitch as possible. “Er...what sort of story would you like to hear?”

All the children began shouting at once. Harry picked out a few words here and there from the din, “a funny story!”, “a scary story!”, “a sad story!” and he chuckled as he lifted his arms to silence the group, and slowly they fell silent.

“Okay, I'm going to tell you a story with a happy ending,” Harry said with a warm chuckle, and a few of the children began to cry out with joy, while at the same time the others quickly hushed them.

“Once upon a time, there was a werewolf child,” Harry began, his lips twitching at the corners as he spoke. “He did not grow up with a pack, but with his wizarding parents. When he was eleven, a very special owl came for him. You see, a great man named Dumbledore had become Headmaster of the wizard school, Hogwarts, and he welcomed every sort of student at his school—even werewolves.

“But the werewolf was nervous. He knew that he needed to keep the fact that he was a werewolf secret, otherwise the wizard children at the school might be afraid of him, because wizards grow up believing that we are dangerous, even though we are not.

“And so, the werewolf boarded the Hogwarts Express on September the First, full of brimming excitement and fear. There, he met some very special boys.”

“Who did he meet?” One of the young boys, Holden, asked, his eyes wide as he leant forward to catch every word of Harry's story.

“He met three boys named James, Sirius, and...Peter.” Harry paused and swallowed his anger at the traitor behind a blank mask, his arms tensing around little Ling for a moment before he continued.

“Though the werewolf was nervous at first, these boys became, in a way, his pack. They were less like friends and more like brothers, but out of fear, the werewolf never told them what he was. He was afraid that if they knew, they would abandon him. However, when they _did_ at last work it out, they did the complete opposite—they accepted him, and more than that, they all decided to learn how to become Animagi so that they could keep their dear friend company as animals during the full moon, instead of as humans.”

“What kind of aminals were they?” one of the younger kids asked, her hands covering her mouth as she stared intently at Harry.

“James became a stag, Sirius a large dog, and Peter was a rat,” Harry answered, and chuckled when the girl sputtered a little.

“But didn't the werewolf _eat_ the rat?” she asked, and Harry smiled humorlessly as he thought, _I wish that he had._

“No,” Harry said at last. “You see, in order to keep the rest of the students safe, the werewolf was forced to transform in a dingy little shack, its tunnel entrance barricaded by a Whomping Willow. The rat's job was to slip under the swinging branches and touch a knot near the hole, which froze the tree. It was a very important job.

“And so from then on, the werewolf had his pack. After Hogwarts, he grew up and fought in two wars, became a Defence Against the Dark Arts professor, married, and had a child. So, sometimes being a werewolf can be scary, but sometimes, it can be wonderful, and great people can enter your life when you least expect it.”

“Was the child a wolf too?” one of the children piped, and Harry shook his head. “Really? How come?”

“I don't know,” Harry answered honestly. “His wife was a Metamorphmagus—someone who could change their appearance whenever they want, and that is what their child was born as, so it might have something to do with that, but I really don't know.”

“It's possible that any potions the werewolf might have been taking suppressed the infectivity of the lycanthropy,” Shannon added, and he was gifted with several blank looks from the children, which made him laugh. “If the werewolf was taking potions, his werewolf parts weren't as strong.”

“Oh,” the child said, and turned to her friends, and they began to whisper to one another excitedly. Slowly, they dispersed, just as Xiang sidled up to Harry and Shannon, and nodded her head to each of them in turn.

“Run along and have your chat, Shannon,” she said, “I shall watch the youngsters.”

“Thanks, Xiang,” Harry said with a small smile, which the older woman returned, before the two male subs turned and hurried off.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Poem is an excerpt from The Goblin Market by Christina Rossetti, 1862. Some of you may also recognize it from Doctor Who :P


	9. Trapped

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Surprise early chapter! Updates are being moved to Sundays, so next update will be a bit later than usual, September 30th, but after that we’ll be back to our usual bi-weekly schedule. Enjoy :)

Chapter Nine – Trapped

 

“So, what's up?” Shannon asked once they'd made it out of earshot of the rest of the pack. “This close to breeding season, I'd assumed you'd want to spend more time with your mate, not with me.”

Harry felt himself flush, and he offered Shannon a weak smile as they both sat down in a small copse of trees, ironically the same one Harry had been hiding in when Shannon had first approached him some weeks before.

“I would be, but something happened, and I’m not sure how to apologize to him without sparking another argument, and I didn’t want to ask his kids...it feels weird, like I’m their...er, _stepmother_ , or something.”

“Well, I’d like to see you try and make any of them clean house for you,” Shannon retorted with a chuckle, “actually, most of them like you, so really I think only Caomh would kick up a stink about something like that. Anyway...what happened, then?”

“It’s so stupid,” Harry said with a heavy sigh of frustration as he leant back against the tree behind him. “Honestly, I think he’s being the git here, not me, but maybe it’s just another werewolf quirk that I’m just not used to yet...”

“Well, when you decide to spit it out, I’ll let you know,” Shannon retorted dryly, and Harry cracked a grin.

“I just...don’t repeat this, all right? I have a feeling that Fenrir would be _pissed_ if this got out, but I just need to talk to someone...all right,” Harry sighed, and at last, began to explain. “We were in our cabin, you know...” Harry trailed off and flushed, while Shannon arched an eyebrow at him.

“Fucking?” he asked, and Harry’s flush deepened. “Practicing for the Breeding Season? Getting your freak on?”

“For the last one, I am not telling you,” Harry retorted with a wry smirk, which made Shannon bark a laugh. “But essentially...yeah. Then after, I sort of...I got a bit cuddly with him, and he froze up like I’d taken a knife to his cock! I don’t get it. Then, when I confronted him about it, he got all defensive, and then he stormed off. I don’t even understand what I did wrong. He said something about it being a really long time since he’s had a mate, and...well, I get the impression that I’m a pretty poor substitute for...whoever he was.”

“Lukas was a lot like you, actually,” Shannon said with a small smile. “He was like a mother to all of us. Very warm, nurturing, the complete opposite to Alpha. And he _loved_ this life.”

“Can you tell me about him?” Harry asked curiously. “I don’t want to invade Fenrir’s privacy, but he only told me the bare minimum when he tried his _sharing_ thing a while back.”

“Yeah, Alpha is a good alpha, but he’s got the personality of a rock,” Shannon stage-whispered, as though Fenrir would overhear them, and Harry laughed a little. “I can tell you a little, but I feel like you two might be better off sorting your stuff out together, instead of involving someone else.”

“If it helps, I don’t plan on tattling on you,” Harry offered, and his fellow sub chuckled softly as he leant back a little, one arm braced around his knee as he gazed up at the leafy canopy.

“A lot of it is common knowledge, so I don’t feel like I’m betraying Alpha by telling you this, but...maybe it might be best to not try and talk with Alpha about this stuff in particular. It happened a long time ago, but he still blames himself for losing Lukas and those kids, so it’s very hard for him to talk about it without breaking something,” Shannon explained, his voice distant and thoughtful. “Anyway, once upon a time—”

“— _once upon a time?_ ” Harry interjected with a chuckle, and Shannon grinned at him.

“Habit. Plus, I was just doing storytime with the kids. Now, be quiet and let me tell you.”

“Okay,” Harry conceded as he nodded his head. “Please, tell the story.”

“Once upon a time,” Shannon repeated, “Fenrir Greyback was known as the only child of our alpha, Rikkard, and his mate, Celeste. They were a good alpha pair, strong and firm, but quick to mete out judgment where it was needed. They had the largest, strongest, and most loyal pack in the British Isles, and everyone knew it.

“Unlike true wolf packs, it is more common for the alpha lines to follow a natural line of succession, meaning that Fenrir was next in line once his father chose to step down. When Fenrir was twenty-two, Rikkard began making plans to do just that, which involved him calling forward all the pack subs for Fenrir to choose a mate, but he was interested in none of them. This led to many arguments between Fenrir and his father, because Fenrir would not be able to take the position as alpha without a breeding partner.

“However, what no one knew at the time was that Fenrir _did_ have a partner—a human wizard, an Irishman named Lukas.

“Lukas loved Fenrir with abandon. He didn’t care that he was a werewolf, he didn’t care about the power he could have gained by associating with a prospective alpha male—none of it. All he cared about was Fenrir. Mind you, this was well before Fenrir had any hatred towards humans, so when Fenrir told him in frustration that he had to choose a mate, and soon, Lukas immediately said, ‘turn me.’

“The rest, as they say, is history,” Shannon finished with a distant smile. “Lukas loved Fenrir, he wanted his cubs, and it was the perfect solution. As a human, he would be incapable of producing children, but as a submissive werewolf, he would gain the ability. He had Faoiltiarna, Anaïs, Flynn, Siobhan, Liam, Erina, the twins—Ciara and Sheehan, Caomh, and he was pregnant with Daibheid when...well...I assume Alpha told you what happened to Lukas, Daibheid, and Faoiltiarna.”

“Yeah, Voldemort killed them to make Fenrir join him,” Harry filled in with a frown. “He told me that part. I just...how can I compare to all that? It sounds like a real-life love story, and I can’t be what this Lukas was to all of you. I’m half the age—or more—of most of his kids, and...it’s just all so strange.”

“No one is asking you to be Lukas, and certainly not Alpha,” Shannon said consolingly as he patted Harry’s shoulder. “No one could be Lukas except Lukas. I think if you even tried, it would hurt Alpha more than the other way round. Alpha wants you, Harry, not a copy of his former mate. Just be yourself.”

“Then what am I supposed to do about his reaction from before?” Harry asked helplessly. “A man can’t live on wild sex alone, you know.”

“I do know,” Shannon agreed with a warm chuckle. “Dustin, my mate, has the same problem. Maybe all doms are a little emotionally stunted, but I think talking it out might help.”

“But does Fenrir even _know_ how to talk about this sort of stuff?” Harry wondered aloud, making Shannon laugh. “He always struck me as a sort of...hit first, as questions later sort of bloke.”

“He definitely is, but he’s also not some emotionless lump,” Shannon pointed out. “If you really need to talk, he’ll listen, but he might not react well to it.”

“What does that mean, _he might not react well to it?_ ” Harry asked as he arched a brow, and Shannon laughed again.

“It means he’ll probably take it personally, storm off in a huff, then come crawling back after someone’s talked some sense into him.”

“Like a scolded puppy,” Harry filled in, and Shannon clapped a hand to his mouth as he began to guffaw.

“I think you are the _only_ one in the pack who would be able to get away with describing Alpha like that,” he said, wiping mirthful tears from his eyes as he spoke, and once he’d calmed down he added, “but on a more serious note, just go and talk to him. He’s not a beast, and he will listen to you, even if he doesn’t want to.”

“I know I should,” Harry replied with a grimace. “But what if he’s still cross with me?”

“He’s working out his issues as we speak,” Shannon replied with a strange sort of smile. “Want to see?”

“What, like some sort of...werewolf therapy?” Harry asked, and Shannon laughed again as he got up with a small groan.

“Not quite,” he replied, and held out a hand to Harry. “Come on, I’ll show you.”

Harry accepted the hand, and Shannon pulled him to his feet before he turned and led him down towards the bathing area. At first, Harry wondered if maybe Fenrir was taking a soak to calm himself down, but Shannon passed the pools without a second glance, and continued on past a towering pile of chopped wood covered by a sheet of ordinary muggle tarpaulin, until they reached a perfectly square space where the dirt had been pressed down flat, and in the centre was Fenrir and one of his sentries, beating each other quite effectively to a bloody pulp.

Harry lurched forward as though to stop them, but a strong hand immediately fell to his shoulder, making him pause. He glanced up, and saw the pack’s beta and Fenrir’s daughter, Anaïs, holding him back.

“Let him be, Alpha Harry,” she said kindly, turning to him a little more and smiling, and it was only then that he noticed the woman’s fresh, shining black eye. “Many dominants need to funnel out their rage with their fists as well as their words. Neither will be hurt.”

“But they’re fighting,” Harry protested as he watched them. “How could you say they won’t be hurt?”

“A dominant’s need to fight is as instinctual as their need to breed, eat, and sleep,” Anaïs said, still smiling. “And so close to the Breeding Season, everyone’s stress levels tend to be higher. People snap at the smallest provocation. It will be better once we have a sibling on the way.”

She winked, and Harry felt himself flush.

“It doesn’t...er, bother you at all?” Harry asked, and Anaïs smiled as she shook her head, her eyes falling upon her father, who had just landed what looked to be a painful kick to his opponent’s side.

“I am forty-two years old, Alpha Harry,” she said simply. “Being so angry about my Alpha’s choice of mate constantly would be exhausting, and I wouldn’t be able to be a good Beta to him if I acted that way. My job is to protect the pack in his stead, and of course, that includes you.”

“I miss my father still,” she continued, the smile never falling from her lips as she spoke. “And I always will, but neither do I want my Alpha to be alone. He deserves someone, don’t you think?”

“Yeah,” Harry agreed, flushing a little at the implication behind her words. “Er...you call your dad alpha?”

“We had two fathers, remember,” she said teasingly, and offered him a kind smile. “We called Fenrir Alpha, and Lukas Dad most of the time to make it easier for them to work out which kid wanted which parent, but if you wish to be technical, my dad was also my mum. We had great fun teasing him about that. I remember...” she trailed off, smiling wistfully, and shook her head. “Still. Gone now.”

“I’m sorry,” Harry offered, “I lost my parents to Voldemort too, but...not like that.”

“Thank you,” Anaïs said, and she smiled again. “Yes, it’s a very different experience when you have memories of the lost loved one, but that doesn’t give me the right to diminish your loss at _his_ hands, either.”

“You’re very different from your...er, brother,” Harry said, and flushed a little when Anaïs began to laugh.

“Oh yes, Caomh is a right piece of work. But you must remember that he was always very close with my dad, and they were a lot alike. Added to that, Caomh has always been a bit on the sensitive side, and tends to lash out at the smallest provocation. Luckily the Breeding Season is soon, and you’ll have something of a break from his antagonism.”

“Yeah, I suppose we’ll both be busy, me with his _father_ ,” Harry said, and arched a brow at her, but she didn’t react to the words. “I mean...I understand why he’s acting this way, if I saw someone new with my dad, I’d probably not react well to it either, but...will he ever...er, calm down?”

“Knowing him, it might take a while,” Anaïs replied with another kind smile, her gaze shifting to the ring, where Fenrir’s opponent was lifting his hands in defeat before he hobbled off, and another dominant male jumped in—curiously after tugging away from Caomh. Anaïs seemed to spot what Harry was looking at, and she chuckled. “That’s Xavier, Caomh’s courting partner.”

“He looks quite a bit older than him,” Harry noted as he looked at Xavier’s long, silver hair, which had been tied into a high ponytail, and his matching gaze—his eyes weren’t simply grey, but like molten silver. He discarded his shirt, which Caomh clung to desperately, and he revealed a smooth, tan chest, as though chiselled from stone.

“Oh, you can talk!” Anaïs said teasingly, and Harry cracked a weak grin. “And besides, Xavier isn’t that much older than him, he just went prematurely grey.”

“Oh, all right then,” Harry replied, smiling weakly as he turned his gaze back to the fight. Xavier was grinning broadly as he hopped from foot to foot, ducking and darting out of the way of Fenrir’s attacks with ease, all the while appearing as though he was having the time of his life. Even Fenrir seemed much more relaxed than before, and was clearly no longer taking the fights as seriously. Though Harry knew nothing of the intricacies of fighting like this, something about watching it—in particular how Fenrir was now shining with sweat, his muscles flexing, and his expression set and fierce, but paired with a wicked smirk—it shot an electric jolt of arousal straight to his groin.

“Oh,” Harry breathed, and when Anaïs and Shannon both eyed him with knowing smirks, he felt a flush rise to his cheeks as he avoided their gazes.

Harry couldn’t quite understand why watching Fenrir fight was having this effect on him. He felt a sudden burning want for him, which made him tingle all over, and his skin seemed to sing. He had the most curious urge to break away from the spectators, and rush to his mate, and drag him to the ground in a flurry of heated kisses—maybe more. He rotated his shoulders, but it didn’t help to quell the feeling. He still _wanted_ him.

_I want everything he wants to give me,_ Harry thought suddenly as his flush worsened. _I want him to fill me with his cubs, I want him to share his life with me—I want to stay here forever._

It occurred to Harry in a vague, dreamlike sort of way that there was something wrong with that mindset. Part of him protested it, and he almost wanted to _scream_ out how wrong it was to feel this for this man, but a larger, stronger part of Harry’s mind didn’t care. He wanted what Fenrir was offering—really, why should he fight it? Fenrir wasn’t bad-looking, he was strong, and Harry could have a life here—a _safe_ life. That in itself was deeply appealing after spending year after year jumping from one life-or-death situation to the next.

Yes, Harry decided as he watched Fenrir smirk as he dodged a blow from his competitor, he could learn to love this.

 

~*~

 

Fenrir could sense that something was wrong.

Which was odd, considering how suddenly things finally seemed to be going _right_.

Even as he fought, no longer angry, but invigorated by the sparring, he could smell his little mate, and, in particular, his arousal. Considering how close the Breeding Season was getting, this was good—better than good, actually. As he’d told Harry over a dozen times, he wanted a _willing_ mate, not an unwilling one.

The dramatic switch in his mate’s behaviour was somewhat concerning, however. What had caused the switch? Why was Harry suddenly so turned on—openly—by him?

Fenrir chanced a glance at the assembled crowd to be certain, and his eye caught Harry’s. The young man flushed, but his gaze did not waver from Fenrir.

Yes, Fenrir realized as he turned back to the fight, just in time to dodge Xavier’s punch, Harry was at last attracted to him.

Fenrir’s inner wolf bayed with joy at this realization. How long had it been? It felt like forever.

_Just a few more weeks, my sweet little sub,_ Fenrir thought as his fist collided with Xavier’s jaw, and he heard Caomh let out a despairing cry as his son’s courting partner crumpled to the ground. _Then you’ll be mine._

~*~

 

“Based on the area that Mr Weasley’s owl, Pig, has canvassed, and the half-completed map scouting Harry’s whereabouts, we have come to one conclusion,” Kingsley pronounced gravely as they started the latest meeting at the derelict house, “it is as we feared—Harry is being held captive by werewolves.”

A collective gasp and chorus of horrified murmured flew around the table, but Neville, Ron, and Hermione all exchanged a dubious look at the reaction of the older adults.

“Ten galleons says they’d never dare react like this if Remus was still around,” Ron muttered darkly, and Hermione nodded in fervent agreement. Molly Weasley, who had recently joined the meetings, hushed them, and Ron’s expression soured at his mother’s admonishment.

“Do we know if it’s Greyback?” Professor Sprout asked, and Kingsley nodded his head once solemnly.

“We believe it is, but whether Harry has yet been turned or not is unknown,” he replied in the same tone of voice, that made Neville want to both hit something and roll his eyes, though he could not determine which emotion was stronger.

“It’s past the full moon,” Hermione said, her voice shaking a little as she spoke, “wouldn’t that mean he’s...turned?”

“Or devoured,” one of the other Order members, who Neville did not know by name, responded. Molly let out a despairing sob, and buried her face in her hands.

“But would Greyback take Harry just to eat him?” Hermione asked, her brow furrowing as she spoke. “Harry wasn’t very big, so I can’t imagine, logically, that that would do much for him.”

“It’s more likely that he turned him, perhaps for his own wicked reasons,” McGonagall said, her lips pressed into a thin line, and her nose flaring with disgust. It did not seem like much of a stretch to guess that _wicked reasons_ referred to something sexual, and Neville felt his stomach turn with disgust.

“Kingsley,” Hermione continued, while ignoring the way a few of the older Order members seemed to huff and roll their eyes, as though Hermione’s constant interruptions were grating on them. Neville clenched his teeth, but for the moment kept quiet—clearly these people did not know Hermione at all if they were trying to dismiss her, but thankfully Kingsley and the other core Order members did not seem inclined to ignore someone as clever as her. “Since it’s fairly clear now that Greyback took Harry, can you have the treason accusations dropped?”

“I have a meeting with the reinstated Wizengamot tomorrow,” Kingsley replied with a nod of his head. “I will bring it up with them. I would need a majority vote in order to do that, and while this information is still mostly speculation, I am certain that it will be enough to drop the treason charges, and open a case for a manhunt for Greyback.” He paused, and pressed a hand to his cheek before he added, “if I am being honest, Miss Granger, I have been fighting the treason charges since reinstating the Ministry, but up until now the Wizengamot refused to see reason as to why such accusations made so little sense. Hopefully now they will.”

“A manhunt for Greyback That may not be necessary,” McGonagall interjected, “if Greyback has turned Harry, he may be unwilling to leave him alone, lest he escape—perhaps it would be better use of our time to find a way into his territory, perform reconnaissance on the area, and rescue Harry.”

“All in favour of rescuing Harry and putting Greyback down like a dog?” Ron called with a slightly manic grin, and every hand around the table flew into the air in fervent agreement.

 

~*~

 

The rumbling had become such a constant for Remus that he knew nothing else. He let out a soft whine past his muzzle, despite the futility of it, and it was met with a pair of low chuckles. He glanced down to his stomach, concave, his ribs sticking out like piano keys. His insides gnawed with hunger, a pain beyond anything he had ever known, and he whined again. How long had it been since he last ate? Days? Weeks? He could no longer remember.

“Almost there, wolfie,” crooned one of the men, “had to take a detour because we had a few of them MLE bastards on our tail, but now...”

He trailed off as the deafening sound of metal scraping against stone filled the air, and Remus choked on the acrid smell of urine and feces that filled the air, paired with hundreds of animal scents.

_No, not just animal scents,_ Remus realized after a half-beat, as whining, shouting, and wolf howls accompanied the overwhelming stench. _Magical Creatures._

Centaur, Unicorn, Dragon, Werewolf—countless others bled together, making it impossible for Remus to identify them all. The way their cries and voices echoed made it clear to Remus that they were inside some sort of enormous warehouse, though this knowledge did little to cheer him. He whined again, but this only made his captors laugh nastily.

The van finally stopped, and he was blinded as the back of the vehicle was thrown open, and two unfamiliar human scents burned his nose.

“Oi, you two, what you playing at?” one man barked, “’e’s no good to us dead, and e’s skin an’ bone! Barely any fur on ‘im!”

“’is not _my_ fault that them MLE bastards been tailing us for the better part of a month, Clive,” snapped Geoff as he joined them at the back. “’ad to shake ‘em, didn’t I? ‘sides, we got time. Nixon and Drew are bringing in a few more from up north, and won’t be back ‘til _well_ after their Breeding Season is over, so we got time to fatten him up again.”

“If ‘e don’t croak first,” added one of the others. “Blimey, how old is this thing? Looks ancient.”

“He had a good pelt on him when we picked him up, you’ll see after a few days what I mean,” grunted Steve. “c’mon, you lot, help me get him to a cage.”

Remus whimpered plaintively, but his vocalization was ignored as the four men hefted him up by his bound ankles and carried him through the warehouse, passing cages filled with all manner of beasts, some horrifyingly disfigured, some merely covered in sick or excrement, and at the very back was a line of cages containing a number of werewolves, none of them moving, but if the way they flinched when the men approached was any indication, they had learned to fear their captors.

They dumped Remus into one of the empty cages, and filled the two metal bowls magically with ground meat in one, and water in the other. They then locked the door of the cage before they freed Remus of his bindings and muzzle before they walked away without so much as a backward glance.

Remus eyed the bowls uncertainly. His stomach was protesting his hesitation, and though the cage and bowls appeared to be clean, if the state of the other captives was any indication, the jailors had no intention of maintaining it. Remus inched slowly towards the bowls, sniffing gingerly at the meat. It smelt like beef, fresh and bloody, much to Remus’s surprise.

He took a few bites before his stomach began to cramp, and Remus forced himself to stop. Though he longed to clean his bowl in an instant, he knew better than that—if he ate too fast, he would make himself sick, and something told him he would not be fed a second time merely because he could not keep down his meal.

Remus lay down with a defeated sigh, and stared longingly at the bowl while he waited for the pain to fade.

 


	10. Breeding Season

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Next update is scheduled for October 14th. Enjoy :)

Chapter Ten – Breeding Season

 

Harry had borne two more moons with the pack since his realization that he could make his relationship with Fenrir work. He had ended up not talking very much with Fenrir on that fateful day, but rather worked out their problems with enthusiastic snogging and groping instead. It had been a great deal of fun, in particular now that Harry had stopped trying to deny his feelings for the alpha werewolf.

However, the recently passed moon, his distant memory of their argument over hand-holding, and the days and weeks that had passed since then were not what was bothering Harry—it was the temperature.

Given that England was a temperate zone, Harry was never accustomed to bitingly cold winters or sweltering summers. The few fluke spikes or drops in temperatures he never reacted favourably to, and this was no exception.

It was hot— _beyond_ hot. Harry could feel his back creating an imprint of sweat on the furs he lay upon, and the heavy arm of his mate that lay across his side felt like a red-hot piece of iron.

Harry moaned, and squirmed out from under the limb as he shed his meagre nightclothes, and doused the fire that was still burning low in the pit.

It wasn’t enough. His body still felt as though it was on fire, and he could feel sweat dripping from everywhere.

Fenrir grunted in his sleep, but Harry hardly noticed as he felt something wet lower down his body. At first, he had assumed it was more perspiration, but in the same breath, he knew, instinctually, that it was _not_ sweat.

_What—what is that?_ Harry wondered with a hazy sort of panic as he reached down, and his fingers were suddenly coated with the slick substance that was coming from his arse. It was slippery, and as Harry’s fingers ghosted over one of the most intimate areas of his body, he let out a weak moan. It felt so _good_.

Without a moment’s hesitation, Harry drove his fingers into himself, and he shuddered like he’d just touched a live wire. His knees buckled, and he barely noticed the sting of the limbs biting into the hard floor of the cabin. Harry whimpered, pressing the digits in as far as he could, but it _still_ wasn’t enough. He needed _more_.

He needed _Fenrir_.

Harry turned, fully intending to wake his mate from his slumber, only to find the alpha already up—in more ways than one.

“Oh, sweet thing,” Fenrir purred as he approached, naked, with his erection jutting out prominently from his body. “It has begun, hasn’t it? The season is here.”

“F-Fenrir...” Harry croaked, his voice pleading as he crawled forward. “Need...I n-need—”

“Shh,” Fenrir murmured as he knelt down, pulling the sub close before he kissed him tenderly—more gently than Harry would have expected, had he been in his right mind. “I know what you need, and I will give it to you.”

“Cubs...n-need...filled...w-want...” Harry stammered, his mind awash with confusion and arousal. Forming any sort of coherent thought was difficult when his instincts had all rushed to the fore, telling him what he _needed,_ not what he wanted.

And what he needed, right now, was for Fenrir to plant his seed, and make something grow. His mate seemed to know this, and scooped the trembling, needy sub up into his strong arms. He carried him back to their bed, throwing him down roughly, but at the same time gently, and he was careful to not hurt Harry as the sub fell back onto the tangle of blankets and furs, and immediately Harry got up on all fours, and spread his thighs invitingly for his mate.

 

~*~

 

The sweet scent of a ripe, fertile mate floated to Fenrir’s nose, and he groaned with need. In his heat-blind state, Harry likely did not even know how enticing he was like this—he was acting on instinct alone, rather than rational thought. All his mate knew was that he was in heat, and needed to be pupped.

“Shh, my pretty little sub,” Fenrir murmured as he stroked his hands down the young man’s thighs, “I know what you need.”

Harry whined again, spreading his legs so far apart that he was at risk of falling over. Fenrir caught his hips without a thought, and he marvelled at how _hot_ Harry was. His skin was flushed, but had he not known that his mate was in heat, he may have worried that he was running a very high fever.

The sub moaned, drawing Fenrir back to the present, and he tugged his mate closer. He keened as he rubbed his dripping arse against Fenrir’s cock, and the alpha let out a soft growl of need, and without warning, he plunged his cock deep into the confines of his mate.

Harry cried out, but Fenrir knew that he was not in pain. The body of a submissive werewolf was built to take a cock, in particular at this time of year. Added to that, Fenrir could see in the young man’s body language and vocalizations that he was lost in the throes of pleasure, and not pain.

“Like that?” Fenrir growled, “oh, pet, I’ll fuck you so good that you’ll be _counting_ the days until the next season...”

Harry answered with a moan, and pressed back insistently against the cock in his arse. Fenrir chuckled at the purely heat-driven action of his little mate, and pulled out slowly before he drove his cock back in forcefully, making Harry cry out in pleasure.

Fenrir growled, overwhelmed by the heat-haze that the scent of Harry caused. He forgot everything but pleasure as he moved, and when he came, he reached down to pull Harry off, only to find the most curious sensation—he felt his wet, sticky seed painting the young man’s belly, but at the same time, he was hard—again.

“Oh, I _love_ breeding season,” Fenrir purred, and moved in to stroke him to release while he waited for his own cock to reassert itself.

 

~*~

 

Harry did not know what time it was, or what day it was. All he knew was pleasure, and the near-constant battering of his arse by his mate’s delicious cock, and the brief respites, wherein his mate would stroke him, bathe him, or hand feed him pieces of meat, bread, or fruit, while he petted his hair and murmured to him gentle reassurances or filthy promises about what he planned to do to Harry next, and it was all so _wonderful_.

Their latest shagging session had started abruptly, and Harry’s lips were still sticky with peach juice and clotted cream as he got on all fours, his cock already aching as he lifted his arse into the air.

“You will be the death of me, my sweet little sub,” Fenrir growled as Harry let out a high, pleading keen, and Fenrir chuckled as he smoothed his large, rough hands across Harry’s bare thighs before he sank into his waiting hole again.

Harry groaned, his mind a blissful blank as he was taken again and again, their pauses thankfully short, Fenrir’s halfhearted complaints about Harry chafing his cock were exaggerations at best, and his naps in between rounds were dreamless and peaceful.

 

When Harry woke again, his mind was hazy, his mouth was dry, and he felt sticky all over. He couldn’t remember what he had had been doing, but if the dull but pleasant throb in his arse was any indication, it had involved a _lot_ of sex _._

A heavy arm lay across Harry’s waist, and when he turned to look at Fenrir, he saw the man was very much naked, and a white crust of dried cum seemed to have matted itself into the hair on his stomach, while the silver locks upon his head were greasy and tangled. Deep, dark purple circles ringed his eyes, and he appeared to be in a deeper sleep than Harry had ever seen him before.

_I guess breeding season came,_ Harry thought sleepily, though it left him with a sense of disquiet over the fact that he could recall none of it. At the same time, he twitched a little, caught between wanting to jerk up in surprise, and longing to stay still so as to not disturb his mate.

_Breeding_.

The word had not immediately clicked with Harry, but now he gazed down at his flat—and _filthy_ —stomach with a strange sense of wonder.

_Is something in there?_ Harry wondered as he reached down a tentative hand, and brushed his fingers gingerly over his skin. It felt the same, save for the sticky mess that was still fused to his skin, and Harry sighed a little.

At the same moment Fenrir grunted next to him, making Harry jump. He turned as he watched Fenrir stir as he woke up, and it appeared as though the alpha was trying to smirk at him, but in his sleepy state it came out much softer, and close to a loving smile.

“Welcome back, Harry,” Fenrir said softly, his voice thick with exhaustion, and he leant in to nuzzle Harry’s shoulder gently, the older man’s bristly beard tickling Harry’s exposed skin pleasantly. “Sweet Moon, I had forgotten just how _wild_ a sub can get around this time...you were amazing.”

“I can’t really remember it,” Harry admitted awkwardly, and Fenrir chuckled a little.

“It will come to you,” he said, “now...would my little mate prefer to eat first, or bathe first...assuming we can unstick ourselves from these furs...”

“You’re disgusting,” Harry said, though he could not help but smile as he said it.

“Bath it is, then,” Fenrir replied, and smirked as he stood up and Harry felt himself flush a little as a pleasant tingle rushed through him while he watched his mate stand and stretch, entirely unbothered by his own nakedness, enabling Harry to bask in his masculine glory, and he felt a small tingle of desire as he gazed at the man who had reduced him to such a mess of bodily fluids in such short order.

Fenrir turned, and Harry flushed when he noticed a number of love bites upon the alpha’s inner thighs. Had _Harry_ put them there? It was a little hard to believe. However, he was given very little time to ponder this as Fenrir casually wrapped one of the furs around Harry’s waist, then scooped him up into his arms, bridal style, making him yelp in surprise.

“What are you doing?” Harry demanded, wiggling a little as Fenrir chuckled, hefting him higher into his arms, and kissed him deeply, cutting all of Harry’s protests short as he burst from the cabin and began to make his way down to the bathing pools.

“What does it look like, pet?” Fenrir purred against his lips, never taking his eyes off of Harry, but miraculously, he never stumbled or lost his way, either. “I am showing you off, but protecting your modesty at the same time. It is expected, to a degree, but I had a feeling you wouldn’t feel exactly comfortable with me carrying you out of our cabin completely starkers, hence the fur.”

“You are _such_ a liar,” Harry retorted, “but...wait...does that mean I’m...?”

“Yes,” Fenrir replied without hesitation. “My seed took root, and you are very much pregnant.”

“But...how can you tell?”

“I have had many children, Harry, and I now have no trouble recognizing the subtle change in your scent. Most of the pack will know it as well, in particular Xiang, who was midwife for my former mate for many years.”

“Oh,” Harry said as they reached the pools, and Fenrir selected one of the private ones before he helped Harry down into the warm, relaxing water. “I...oh.”

“You don’t sound exactly excited,” Fenrir said accusingly, and crossed his arms while he eyed the sub suspiciously as he sank into the bath as well. “I thought you wanted this?”

“I do, I mean, I did...” Harry winced at how that sounded, and offered his mate an apologetic look. “It’s just...a lot to take in.”

 

~*~

 

Fenrir watched his little mate as he spoke. He was running his hand across his filthy stomach, his expression an odd mixture of alarm and wonder. With so many fluids dried into his skin he hardly looked attractive and fey-like anymore, but Fenrir was not so bothered by this; he knew what beauty lay beneath the grime. The indecision was what concerned him more—Had Harry only said that he’d wanted his cubs to _please_ him?

_But that makes no sense,_ Fenrir thought as he watched his mate. _Harry has so much fire, as much as me. Why would he bend over and just_ let _me have my way with him?_

“Come here,” Fenrir said gruffly in an effort to cut off his own thoughts, “let me wash you.”

Harry smiled and obeyed without hesitation, and again Fenrir felt that tingle of uncertainty as he picked up the soap off the edge of the basin, and began to gently wash the dried cum off Harry’s chest and stomach.

 

Fenrir’s concern mounted as the bath continued, with Harry insisting on returning the favour, and he gently washed his mate, despite all the physical tells that indicated that Harry was still exhausted from their eight days of almost non-stop sex. Harry was being too nice too him, too sweet, too _considerate_. While it was pleasant, something about it rubbed Fenrir the wrong way, and instead of it endearing him to Harry, it made him want to back away slowly.

Fenrir swallowed his concern behind a neutral mask as they washed. It would not do to alarm Harry with his worries, especially not now that he was pregnant, and he mentally kicked himself for being so foolish. What had he _done_ to Harry? Why hadn’t he noticed his odd behaviour earlier?

_This isn’t how I pictured this all happening..._ Fenrir mused as he helped Harry from the tub, wrapped him securely in a fluffy towel before he scooped up his weakened mate again, and carried him back to their cabin. Harry whined, protesting halfheartedly that he could walk himself, but more than the fact that Fenrir knew that he was too fatigued to do so, it was quite clear that Harry was enjoying the attention, even if he was too proud to admit it.

“No, seriously, Fen,” Harry protested weakly as they crossed the threshold back into their cabin, while Fenrir stared at him incredulously. _Fen?_ “I’m fine to walk on my own.”

“Are you, now?” Fenrir asked, arching a brow at his mate.

“Yes, I am,” Harry said as he crossed his arms. “You can put me down any time you like.”

“All right then,” Fenrir replied, smirking a little as he gently turned Harry so that he could stand, “off you go then.”

Fenrir released him, and Harry made it barely three wobbly steps before he yelped and began to fall, but Fenrir was there in an instant, and swept Harry back into his arms with a self-satisfied smirk.

“Prat,” Harry complained without any real venom, and crossed his arms. “Why the hell am I so weak all of a sudden?”

“It might have something to do with the fact that we shagged nonstop for almost eight full days,” Fenrir said dryly, making Harry flush an attractive pink. “That would make any normal man a little weak-kneed.”

“Then why aren’t _you_ tired?”

“I said any _normal_ man, pet,” Fenrir said with a chuckle as he carried Harry back over to their bed, and laid him back down on the conspicuously clean bedding, which he suspected that Xiang had changed in their absence. “I am extraordinary.”

“Of course you are,” Harry said as he rolled his eyes, and swatted his chest lightly. “Mind you, having your eleven-inch battering ram up my arse for that long...it’s a miracle I can even clench my arse at this point.”

“Ah, so you admit you’re a little weak at the moment?”

“I think you made that perfectly clear when I tried to walk on my own and nearly fell over,” Harry said dryly as he rolled his eyes. “As long as I’m not expected to walk anywhere for the next little while, I’m not too upset about that.”

Fenrir eyed him dubiously as once more he felt a tingle in the pit of his stomach, negation at Harry’s curious statement. Since when was Harry Potter _okay_ with being temporarily weakened?

“I’m going...to get you something to eat,” Fenrir said, and scowled a little at the nervousness that wove through his voice. Since when did he, Fenrir Greyback, get nervous about _anything_?

“Okay,” Harry said as he wormed his way under the blankets and furs. “Don’t be long.”

Fenrir nodded gruffly, then remembered belatedly to pull on some jeans before he turned on his heel and headed for the door.

 

Outside, Fenrir pivoted his heel, heading away from the kitchens and made for a mid-sized cabin that hugged the edge of the cliffside. The healer’s cabins were a little larger than his own, and could hold up to ten injured wolves at any one time, but it was also the permanent residence of their healers, two subs named Marie and Aidan.

It was the latter who opened the door, and the spry twenty-five-year-old looked positively ridiculous with a head of shaggy blue-green hair and a stainless steel ring through his right nostril.

“Alpha!” Aidan squeaked in surprise as he gazed at him. “What brings you by? Are you all right?”

“I’m fine,” Fenrir grunted, “may I come in? I need to speak with Marie about my mate, and I’d rather not be overheard.”

“Oh, yes, of course,” the youth said as he flushed, and hurriedly stepped aside to admit him.

Fenrir grunted again, and ducked his head a little to fit under the door frame as he stepped into the cabin. It was empty, save for Marie, a Caribbean woman whose black hair was tied back in a long ponytail of dreadlocks and red beads, and she seemed to be poring over some sort of volume on healing. Aidan coughed, and the young woman jerked in surprise as she gazed up at the alpha with wide eyes.

“Alpha!” she squeaked in a tone very similar to Aidan’s as she snapped her book shut and stood up. “What brings you by?”

“I already asked him that,” Aidan said helpfully, “he said it’s something to do with Alpha Harry.”

“I am standing right here, you ridiculous pixie,” he said crossly, making the sub flush with embarrassment. “I can tell your superior myself.”

“He’s as good as me at healing, Alpha,” Marie said with a frown as she reached them, and folded her arms across her chest. “His hair colour doesn’t make him a bad healer.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Fenrir said, waving his hand dismissively, while he fought the urge to deck Aidan for rolling his eyes at the alpha’s lack of apology. “I am here for my mate, not myself.”

“Is he all right?” Marie asked, her amber eyes softening as she gazed up at their leader.

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know if he’s all right?” Aidan asked, and Marie frowned at him.

“Aidan, love, if you have time for colour commentary, then you also have time to do something useful, like washing out the bedpans.”

Grumbling, the youth stomped off, and Fenrir refocused his gaze on Marie again as he elaborated by saying, “he is acting very oddly, and it has me concerned.”

“Oddly how?” Marie asked, her curiosity shifting to the more stern tone of a healer as she added, “Alpha, I know you’re not exactly one to share, but I’ll need as much information as possible if I am to help your mate.”

Somewhat reluctantly, Fenrir relayed to the healer everything he’d noticed of late with Harry. From his more amiable and wildly uncharacteristic behaviour before and after the breeding season, to his willingness to be taken care of in his weakened state—everything. Marie listened patiently throughout his entire explanation, never once interrupting him, but her grave expression did not exactly reassure him what whatever was happening was anywhere in the realm of _good_.

“Yes, I can see why you might be concerned,” Marie said as he’d finished, her lips pulled into a frown. “Come sit down, Alpha, we need to talk.”

Marie waved him over to the desk she’d so recently vacated, and sat down again. Fenrir sat across from her, feeling very uncomfortable. If Marie noticed his unease she did not comment on it, and reached into one of her desk drawers, pulling out a thick volume called _Fairy Tales_.

“What...?” Fenrir began, but the healer cut across him as she pressed her hands to the dark green cover and began to speak.

“Alpha, it sounds to me like Harry is suffering from a disorder that the muggles refer to as _Stockholm Syndrome_. It is a disease of the mind where a captor begins to care for their jailor as a means to cope with what has happened to them,” she explained patiently, while she opened the book, and began to flick through the tome in front of her, until at last she stopped on a tale titled, _Belle et la Bête._ She pushed the open book towards him so that he could see it. “This tale, though it is not a true telling of Stockholm Syndrome in the strictest sense, I think it may help you understand better than technical jargon, and may give you some ideas on how to remedy it.”

“I have heard of this,” Fenrir said as he studied the first page of the tale. “One of the muggleborn wolves told me...there is talking furniture and singing and dancing?”

“Not quite, Alpha,” she said as she pressed her lips together, as though she was trying to keep from laughing. “This is a version of the original story, and is much darker than the film. In the story, Beauty becomes more and more depressed being held captive by the Beast, and in an effort to help her and show his love for her, Beast sends her away and back to her family, but tells her that if she does not return within two days, he will die. There are many discussions about whether this is a show of devotion or a manipulation, but what I mean is—”

“Are you suggesting that I _send_ Harry away?” Fenrir demanded incredulously, his eyes wide. “ _Now?_ For God’s sake, Marie, he’s _pregnant_. You can’t seriously expect me to send away my mate in this state, can you?”

“I thought he might be,” Marie said with a humourless smirk, and put away the book, as though she knew that Fenrir wouldn’t bother to read it. “I would not imply that you send him away all on his own, it may be too much of a shock, and he could miscarry as a result. At the same time, I think that you going with him may be counterproductive. You took him here against his will, Alpha, and you held him here until, unbeknownst to you, his mind began to break down in an effort to deal with it all. Perhaps one of the pack members who is closer with him can go with him, and he can spend a few days free?”

“But how do I know he won’t run off?” Fenrir asked, arching a brow, and Marie offered him a sad sort of smile.

“You won’t, and that’s the point, Alpha,” she said. “I think you know what he would choose in the end, but now it is time for you to _let_ him choose, don’t you think?”

 


	11. Choosing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Next update is scheduled for October 28th. Enjoy ^.^

Chapter Eleven – Choosing

 

Harry lay stretched out on the bed, his fingers trailing over his flat abdomen, and a lazy smile upon his face as he gazed down at his own naked body.

Under normal circumstances, he would never admire himself like this. However, knowing that out of his and Fenrir’s very frequent and _very_ satisfying orgasms over the last several days had created a life—it somehow made that region of his body even more beautiful to him.

He was enjoying looking at it, given that most of the rest of him was too worn out to really function, but at the same time he was ravenously hungry, and Fenrir was taking _far_ too long in fetching him something to eat.

Almost as though on cue, Fenrir stepped through the door, his hands empty, and a stricken, heartbroken look was painted across his face.

“Fen?” Harry asked as he sat up, swaying a little from his exhaustion, but he ignored it as he kept his focus on his mate. “What’s wrong? What happened? Are you all right?”

“Everything’s fine, pet,” Fenrir replied, though he would not look at Harry as he said it.

“If everything’s fine, then why did you go out for food, and come back looking as though somebody’s _died_?” Harry demanded, his voice cracking a little. “There’s something you’re not telling me.”

“It’s nothing,” Fenrir insisted, his voice snapping as he spoke, and he bared his teeth a little, as though he longed to put Harry in his place for showing such insolence to his alpha. “I forgot your breakfast.”

Without another word, Fenrir turned and raced from the cabin.

Harry stared at the spot that had so recently been occupied by his mate, and he blinked, trying to decide if he should be cross or not, or if Fenrir was just being _weird_.

“But when is Fenrir ever _weird_?” Harry wondered aloud as he stared at the door, just as Fenrir burst back through it with two overfilled platters of food, and a water skin hooked onto one of the loops of his jeans. While it gave Harry ample opportunity to ogle his mate, Harry wasn’t about to suggest they _do_ anything at present. He was quite certain his legs _and_ arse wouldn’t be able to hold out if they tried.

“Careful, it’s still hot,” Fenrir warned as he rested one of the platters next to Harry, and offered him the water.

“You’re really caring for a great, infamously terrifying beast,” Harry mused dryly, but thankfully Fenrir seemed to understand that he was teasing, and huffed a little as he pushed Harry’s shoulder lightly.

“Eat,” he commanded, “you still look dead on your feet.”

Harry chuckled, obeying as he tucked into the platter of sausage, potato, and mixed fruit, along with some kind of steamed green that exploded like a rush of water in his mouth. It was all delicious, and before he knew what he was doing he’d cleaned his plate, then crawled over to Fenrir’s and began to sneak bits of meat and potato off his plate, though if the dominant noticed, he never complained.

“Is it...” Harry trailed off, his head resting against Fenrir’s thigh as they both continued to eat off the same plate, and he brushed his free hand across his flat abdomen, leaving a faint streak of grease in its wake.

“Is it what?” Fenrir asked, finishing off his breakfast before he pushed away the platter, and began to stroke Harry’s hair. He sighed, and leant into the touch.

“Is it really in there?” Harry asked, and pressed his head more insistently against Fenrir’s hand, making the alpha chuckle.

“I have not mated myself to a werewolf,” he remarked, his tone light with amusement. “It appears I’ve mated myself to a _cat_.”

“Shut up and answer the question,” Harry retorted, which made Fenrir chuckle again.

“Yes, it’s really in there,” he replied, his voice soft with adoration as he spoke. “Once you are feeling a bit more like yourself, we can—”

Fenrir broke off suddenly, and when Harry glanced up, he saw that a stricken look had crossed his mate’s face again.

“Fen?” Harry asked, but he did not respond. “Fenrir? What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” he said shortly, “I suppose...I’m probably just tired from pounding your arse for eight days in a row.”

“Oh,” Harry replied as he relaxed, and offered his mate a smile. “Well...speak for yourself—at least you can _walk_.”

Fenrir chuckled warmly, and returned to petting Harry’s hair.

 

~*~

 

After two days of rest, Harry seemed to be back to his old self, and he began to integrate back into Pack Life. The other subs surrounded him often, chattering excitedly over his pregnancy, one of only three subs who had managed it during the Season, while Harry appeared as though he had no idea how to react to all the attention.

Fenrir kept his distance, his expression pinched as he observed his mate, while he tried to decide what to do. Did Harry _really_ have the mind disease that Marie spoke of, or was she just against his decision to take a mate that was just _barely_ an adult by both werewolf and wizard standards?

Fenrir shook his head, wishing he could ask someone for advice, but he knew that he couldn’t—he was alpha, after all, and asking advice for how to handle his mate was no way for a leader to behave.

_I need to decide this on my own,_ Fenrir thought, _but what is the right course of action? I don’t want to lose him, even for a day—how can I listen to Marie’s suggestion and send him away, especially in his condition? How stupid can she be, asking me to do that?_

“Alpha?” a voice said, and he turned to see his beta and daughter, Anaïs standing before him. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” he grunted, “just thinking about things.”

“Would these things include my new stepfather?” she asked, her voice half-teasing, and Fenrir arched a brow at her.

“You call him that?” he asked, and she let out a short laugh.

“Not to his face, no,” she replied with a warm smile. “He’s still understandably uncomfortable with the fact that all of us are older than him, so I think it would make him _less_ comfortable if we all started to call him _dad_. Most of us just call him Alpha Harry, as you know.”

“I do,” Fenrir replied, nodding his head. He was pleased with Anaïs’s response; the last thing he needed was Harry to feel even less comfortable around Fenrir’s children—his little mate already barely spoke to them except for when he had to, as though he had no idea how to interact with them.

“Alpha,” Anaïs said, her tone light, but baring an undercurrent of suspicion to it. “What’s wrong, seriously? I haven’t seen you this pensive in years—what’s going on?”

“Nothing—” Fenrir began, and his daughter scowled.

“ _Dad_ ,” she said, using his parental title to make sure she had his full attention. “Please, what’s wrong?”

Fenrir tried to ignore his daughter’s questions, but as she huffed with annoyance, he realized that he would not be getting out of this so easily.

“Would you stop being the alpha for ten seconds?” she hissed, and Fenrir’s gaze whirled to her, his eyes narrowing into a glare, but she didn’t back down, and glared right back as she met his eyes in challenge, but her expression had softened to something more plaintive. “Please, Father, I want to help if I can. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen you so upset.”

“You can’t help,” Fenrir grunted as his shoulders sagged a little in defeat, and his gaze shifted to Harry, who was smiling shyly as he spoke with Shannon, who he seemed to have struck up a friendship with. “I’m the one who will have to let Harry go, not you.”

“Let him—Dad, what are you talking about?”

“It was Marie’s idea, not mine,” he continued, his arms firmly crossed as he gazed at his little mate from across the territory, and he noted how Caomh was one of the few subs not gathered around Harry and sharing in his good news. “She said he had some sort of disease of the mind, because of how I claimed him. She said the only way to cure it was to let Harry go, and have him decide for himself whether he wants to be here or not.”

“Oh,” she said, her eyes shifting over to where Harry sat, her brow knitted with worry. “But _now_? Dad, if Harry feels like you’ve abandoned him, he might miscarry—you know how delicate werewolf pregnancies can be.”

“I have no idea how to broach the subject, but I do know a thing or two about letting people down gently—when the situation calls for it.”

“You do?” Anaïs asked, arching a brow, “ _really_?”

“Bite your tongue,” Fenrir retorted, and his daughter offered him a small, almost teasing smile. “I know how to do it, but as alpha, you know I can’t go in for being a soft, touchy-feely pushover that often. The point is I _do_ know how to do it.”

“Okay, okay,” his daughter said with a dismissive wave of her hand, “I believe you, no need to get so defensive.”

Fenrir pursed his lips as he growled under his breath, but that only made his child laugh out loud.

“Oh, I know that look—” she said with another laugh, “Alpha, you don’t need to get so...so... _grumpy_. I’m trying to help.”

Anaïs laughed again when Fenrir glared at her following her accusation that he was being _grumpy_ , of all things, though this time she was doubled over with laughter. Harry’s inquisitive eyes whipped over to the pair of them, reminding Fenrir painfully of the decision he still had to make. With another annoyed growl, he turned and stomped off.

Fenrir made it to the trees that circled the territory before he slowed to a stop, and he leant against a sturdy oak as he heaved a frustrated sigh.

_What was he going to do about Harry?_

Marie’s advice to let him go was still clattering around his head, every word like a searing brand. He needed to let Harry go, to let him decide for _himself_ if he really wanted this life, wanted _Fenrir_ , but part of him balked at the idea.

_What if he never came back?_

Fenrir hated that the mere idea that Harry might leave him—with his unborn cub, no less—and never return. The mere concept of it was almost too much for Fenrir to bear.

But to resign himself to this more softened, pleasant form of his mate made his stomach turn over. Harry needed to find himself again, and Fenrir needed to be strong, and let him go.

_He’ll come back, I know he will,_ Fenrir thought, but the reasoning felt feeble. Harry had fought him tooth and nail all the way up here; what reason would he have to actually come _back_?

“Fen?”

The small, uncertain voice drew Fenrir from his thoughts, and he glanced up to see his mate peering through the trees and gazing at Fenrir with concern. A hand was pressed, fingers splayed outward, against one side of his stomach almost protectively as he asked, “are you all right?”

“Fine,” he grunted, unwilling to look at Harry as he spoke. “Why do you ask?”

“Mostly because I saw you have an argument with Anaïs and storm off,” Harry explained with a small smile. “I was worried.”

“Well, there’s no need to stress yourself in your condition,” Fenrir replied while Harry inched forward slowly. “I’m _fine_.”

“In my _condition_?” Harry demanded, arching an eyebrow. “Fen, I’ve been pregnant for less than twenty-four hours, I hardly need to freak out about it yet.”

“On the contrary, you _do_ ,” Fenrir countered as he glared at his mate. “The pregnancy will be extremely delicate until your fourth week—werewolf pregnancies are much shorter than human ones.”

“Wait, only my _fourth_ week?” Harry asked, his eyes narrowing slightly. “Just how much shorter _are_ werewolf pregnancies?”

“About four months.”

“Four months shorter?”

“No, four months total,” Fenrir replied, and most amusingly, Harry raised his eyebrows high with shock.

“But how does that give the baby enough time to grow and everything?” Harry asked, and Fenrir chuckled at Harry’s wide-eyed wonder, like a new cub being told why the sky is blue.

“Magic is a wonderful thing, my sweet little mate,” Fenrir replied, smirking a little when Harry flushed with embarrassment. He shuffled forward and wrapped his arms around Fenrir’s waist before he pressed his cheek to the dominant werewolf’s chest, and let out a tiny sigh.

Fenrir wrapped his arms around Harry, and held him close. He bowed his head, inhaling his sweet scent, and tried to banish the pain from his mind, certain that Harry would be able to sense it.

_I need to let him go, to find his own feet again, and regain his fight_ , Fenrir thought, _but I don’t know if I can._

 

~*~

 

Remus shivered as he curled up more tightly in the centre of his cage.

The pristine state of his prison was long since gone, and he was surrounded now by the reek of his own excrement. He’d tried to relieve himself through the bars in an effort to keep his space clean, but it was difficult to aim, and the best he could hope for was for nothing to pool in the bottom of the cage, or end up in his food or water bowls.

Remus had lost count of the days, but he knew he’d been here for a while. His muscles ached from lack of use, his stomach cramped every time he ate, and when his captors wandered past him, they felt compelled to kick his cage, or slam something hard against it, making him jump and yelp with fright, which always made them laugh.

 

“Where the _hell_ are those prats?” Remus heard one of his captors yell one day, and his ears flattened as he feigned sleep, and listened to their voices get louder. “It’s been nearly three and a half months since we picked up that wolf off Hogwarts grounds, and you’re telling me those idiots up north _still_ haven’t brought back those wolves from the pack we’d been scouting?”

“It’s all here in the letter, sir,” one of the others said, while the leader let out a shout of anger and kicked one of the empty cages, and Remus shivered as he listened to it skitter noisily across the concrete. “They ran into some trouble, and so they need to take a longer route back. It might be a few more weeks, at least.”

“Tell them to hurry up,” he snarled back, “and get someone to clean up these mutts—it’s disgusting. Keeping them around is costing me money, and the sooner we can unload their furs, the better.”

“Yes, sir,” one of the men said, and Remus watched through a slit eye as the leader turned and stormed away, while the other men trolled up and down the line of caged werewolves, vanishing the excrement, but never once going within two feet of any of the cages.

“I just don’t get why we don’t skin ‘em now, if they’re costing Stewie so much money,” one of them complained, flicking his wand at the wolves, and cleaning their oily fur with a few hasty jabs of his wand.

“’cos skinning a magical creature ain’t like skinning a cat, Ruiz,” snapped the other man. “They give off magic, and I’ve seen some of ‘em blow craters in the ground as their magic tries to protect ‘em, even in their wolf skin. It draws attention, and so it’s safer to do ‘em all at once instead of one by one. Same goes for everything else in this damn slaughterhouse. If you go slow with harvesting everything, the Ministry is bound to notice, and I dunno about you, but I’d rather _not_ spend my best years in Azkaban. Got it?”

“Yeah,” he grumbled, while Remus curled up in a tighter ball, and tried to block out their voices, “I got it.”

 

~*~

 

Harry eased back upon his bed in the Healer’s cabin, his gaze flitting between the punk rock-looking werewolf and his superior, both of whom kept exchanging knowing looks before they glanced to Harry’s mate, who glared in response, as though they were having a three-way silent conversation that didn’t include him.

It bothered Harry, but at the same time, he felt too comfortable and safe to really care enough to call them out on it. Instead, he fidgeted pointedly on the bed, and the elder healer wolf, Marie, offered him a small, apologetic smile.

“Let’s see how you’re doing today, eh, Alpha Harry?” she asked kindly, and Harry nodded as she pushed up his shirt, exposing his stomach, while he compulsively reached for Fenrir, who seemed highly embarrassed by his mate’s neediness, but indulged him nonetheless as he laced his fingers with the sub’s.

“Ah, so it seems you are a fortnight along,” Marie said as she prodded at Harry’s abdomen with her wand, making him wince, and he fought with the compulsion to bat her wand away. Somehow, anyone touching his stomach who wasn’t Fenrir felt _wrong_.

“And the babe?” Fenrir asked before Harry could, and she offered the alpha a warm, knowing smile.

“They’re just fine, Alpha,” she replied, “I see...two heartbeats, so a small litter, but as I recall, most strong werewolves veer towards smaller births, rather than large ones.”

“I’m having twins?” Harry asked weakly, and Marie nodded.

“You’re due for late December, Alpha Harry,” she replied kindly. “And as of right now, your two little ones seem perfectly healthy.”

Harry beamed, but when he turned to share with Fenrir this wonderful news, he was startled when Fenrir abruptly dropped his hand and stormed from the cabin.

“Oh dear,” Marie said, her hand coming to her mouth, while Harry spun back to her, his eyes wide with concern.

“What is it?” Harry demanded, his voice close to panic, “was it something I said?”

“No, dear, it wasn’t you,” Marie replied as her silent companion, Aidan, suddenly turned and walked away from the bed where Harry lay, as though he was trying to give Harry some privacy. “Alpha just has a lot on his mind, that’s all.”

Harry very seriously doubted if that was _all_ , but said no more as Marie did a few final checks before she pulled his shirt back down, and allowed him to go.

Harry immediately bolted from the bed and hurried out into the main area of the territory, his gaze whipping back and forth as he searched for his mate, at last finding him with his thick arms crossed across his chest, and he was speaking to Shannon and Dustin.

The mated pair were both bearing similar looks of shock upon their faces, though Dustin more than Shannon—Harry’s friend merely looked curious, rather than wholly shocked, as though he was more surprised by Alpha speaking to them than the topic itself.

Harry took an uncertain step forward, and immediately Fenrir’s gaze turned to him, as though he’d sensed Harry’s approach.

Harry froze, and stared up at Fenrir uncertainly as the alpha crossed the space, wrapped a possessive arm around his waist, and began to guide him away from the others.

“Come with me,” Fenrir said, his voice commanding, “we need to talk.”

 


	12. Holiday

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Hey guys, thank you so much for your continued support of this story. It’s always a bit of a tossup when writing rarepairs, and I get so excited when I read comments from you guys, so thank you again. The next update will be November 11th.

Chapter Twelve – Holiday

 

Harry didn’t like his mate’s tone—not in the _least. Talk_? _About what? Why did he sound so grave? Was something wrong with the babies?_

The questions were making him dizzy, and Harry was only vaguely aware of Fenrir leading him back to their cabin as he began to hyperventilate.

“Baby, breathe, you’re going to faint,” Fenrir said, pulling Harry flush against his chest as he moved to stroke his back gently with a tenderness that he only ever reserved for Harry.

Harry shivered, burying his face in Fenrir’s chest, inhaling his sharp, musky scent while he tried to calm down. In truth, he had no idea _why_ he was freaking out, nor how they’d gotten to their cabin so fast.

“’M sorry,” Harry mumbled, “I don’t even know _why_ I’m freaking out so much.”

“It’s hormones, pet,” Fenrir reassured him, bowing forward to press a kiss to the top of Harry’s head. “Just let me take care of you.”

Fenrir suddenly froze, as though he’d spoken some sort of horrible curse, and his arms tensed around Harry. Harry clutched to him harder, confused and worried, while Fenrir rubbed his back soothingly, and didn’t say a word.

 

~*~

 

Despite Fenrir’s claim that he needed to talk to Harry, he quickly discovered that the prospect of willingly sending his mate away while with child was harder than he’d expected it to be. Instead of talking with Harry, he simply held his softened, sweet little mate, and tried to commit his scent to memory.

They hardly left the cabin, and spent their time largely in bed, with Harry curled up in his arms as Fenrir gleefully blew off his duties, and opted instead for a leisurely day with his mate, both of them having forgotten Fenrir’s initial reason for pulling him aside in the first place.

A few hours later, Fenrir ventured out to get some food for himself and Harry, but this quest was quickly intercepted by Dustin, who crossed his arms and frowned at Fenrir accusingly.

Fenrir glared at the dom, who was nearly a full foot shorter than the alpha, with unkempt, dirty blond hair and a short, bristly beard, with sharp blue eyes ringed with gold, a darker shade than Fenrir’s own.

“Alpha,” Dustin said, his tone almost accusing. “Shannon and I have been ready to go _all day_. Xiang is watching the girls, and we already sent an owl off to make a reservation at an inn just outside of London. What is taking so long?”

“Look, maybe _you_ are fine with abandoning your mate at such a delicate time, but I’m _not_ ,” Fenrir snapped, making Dustin’s eyes widen a little at the alpha’s scathing tone. “This pregnancy is making him ultra-sensitive, and excuse me if I’m trying to keep from hurting him.”

“He’ll be hurt no matter how you do it,” Dustin reminded him impatiently. “Better to do it now than drag it out. And you know us, Alpha, we’ll keep Harry _and_ your unborn children safe—that’s a _promise_.”

“I know that,” Fenrir snapped, “I’d be foolish not to. I know that you two will keep him safe—I’ll kill you if you don’t—and I know it needs to be done, but that knowledge hardly makes it any easier.”

Dustin glanced away from Fenrir, his jaw muscle twitching slightly as he gazed around them, as though he was trying to come up with some sort of retort, but kept coming up empty.

“Fine,” he said at last with a small huff. “Just...Alpha, try and do it soon. The faster Harry gets out of here and starts healing, the better.”

Fenrir grunted, his annoyance at the dominant tangible. Dustin did not react, but instead headed towards the trees, perhaps to cool down after their argument.

Fenrir forced himself to ignore Dustin as he headed to where the pack cooks were situated, in a mid-sized cabin filled with wood stoves and most of their perishable food stores, and accepted two bowls of thick, hearty stew from the cooks, as well as a full loaf of bread.

With the food in hand, and the sense that he was properly providing for his mate and unborn cubs, he strode back towards his cabin, only to stop dead outside of it.

The scent that surrounded the cabin should have been only that of Harry and himself, and _maybe_ Anaïs. Instead, he smelt Shannon, a sub who had not only brazenly gone into _his_ personal territory, but also crossed Fenrir’s scent markers to do it.

Fenrir dropped the food, his mind shifting to something close to panic as he hurriedly opened the door, only to find the space empty.

No Shannon, and no Harry.

Fenrir was shaking slightly, trembling not with anger, but fear. A single sheet of paper had been left upon the made bed of furs. It bore Shannon’s scent, and only three words.

 

_I’m sorry, Alpha._

 

Harry was gone.

 

~*~

 

Harry stepped down the incline slowly, following Shannon, with his head cocked curiously at the fellow sub. He’d never been this far into the woods before—at least, not since he and Fenrir had arrived at the pack—and it felt odd to be this deep without his mate present.

“Where are we going?” Harry asked jumping a little at a loud rustle in the foliage, only to see Dustin burst from the trees a moment later, panting as he grabbed onto Shannon’s hand and offered him a smile, which the sub returned warmly.

“We’re going on a little adventure,” Shannon explained after he’d shared a kiss with Dustin, “it’s all right to go, we have permission.”

“Do we have to?” Harry asked, slowing to a stop as he gazed back up the mountain towards the pack’s territory. “I’d rather stay here with my mate.”

“Come on,” Shannon encouraged with a soft smile, “it’ll be fun, I promise. Plus, it will probably do you good to get some air.”

“I guess...” Harry muttered, his tone still heavy with uncertainty, and he gazed back up at the territory for a second time. “Fenrir knows we’re going?”

“Er, yeah,” Dustin said unconvincingly, “he knows.” Harry arched his eyebrows at the dominant, but Shannon quickly interjected before Harry could speak.

“He _does_ know,” Shannon said. “I swear. I even left a letter for him, just in case.”

“Oh, all right then,” Harry replied, relaxing a little. “As long as he won’t be cross that I’ve left.”

“Don’t worry, Harry,” Dustin said kindly, “he knows it’s for the best.”

Harry didn’t quite know what that meant, but he nodded a little in agreement nonetheless, and smiled as he followed the mated pair farther down the mountain.

 

The trio walked for about an hour, chatting amicably, but Harry couldn’t help but feel _odd_ as they made it farther away from his new home. He would pause and glance back frequently, wondering how Fenrir was faring without him. Often, Shannon or Dustin would have to call his name several times before he was able to shake himself out of his daze, and he hastily followed them farther away from home.

On the edge of the wood, which came much faster than Harry had expected, Shannon took hold of Harry’s hand with a smile, before he hooked an arm around Dustin’s neck, and the shorter dominant dragged the three of them away in Side-Along Apparition.

 

They reappeared in what seemed to be some sort of small township, right in front of an inn called _The Bread and Breakfast_ , and the display window next to the door bore several fresh loaves of artisanal bread.

Off in the distance, Harry spotted a few distinct London landmarks, and he felt a sudden urge to ask his companions if they could go down to Diagon Alley for the afternoon, in particular now that he wasn’t a fugitive anymore.

At least, if the articles in the stolen copies of the _Daily Prophet_ were to be believed.

“We can go visit Diagon Alley soon,” Shannon said suddenly, drawing Harry’s attention back to his fellow sub. “We can stay here for a few days, if you like. Breathe the fresh air, a holiday from pack life, all that. Especially now that the Ministry is no longer hunting you. We can do _anything_ you like.”

“Can we go home?” Harry asked, and Shannon’s smile fell a little.

“Not quite yet,” Dustin said with a warm chuckle that sounded a little forced. “Shan and I haven’t been out of the pack for _ages_ and we’d like a chance to explore, too.”

Harry eyed him oddly, but the strange smile never faded from the dominant’s face. The silence that passed between the trio got heavier and more awkward until Shannon laughed, and clapped Harry on the shoulder.

“Enough with the third degree, Harry!” he said, laughing again as he turned Harry and began to guide him towards the inn. “Let’s have some fun!”

“Fun,” Harry echoed, “I guess.”

 

After they checked into the inn, Dustin, Shannon, and Harry meandered through the village. They explored all the little quirky shops and eateries they could find, including a place called _Buds,_ wherein Shannon complimented the owner on his lovely glass vases, and didn’t understand until later why Harry and Dustin had found it so funny.

In the early evening, they opted for a Parisian-style outdoor café for a break and something to drink, where they sipped lattés (hot chocolate for Harry) and watched the sun slowly cross the sky.

“We can go into Diagon Alley tomorrow, if you like,” Shannon offered again with a small smile, while Harry used his spoon to eat the whipped cream off his drink.

“I suppose,” Harry replied with a vague shrug, which made Dustin frown.

“Something on your mind, Harry?

“I just miss Fenrir, I guess,” Harry mumbled, pausing to stuff another spoonful of whipped cream into his mouth. “I think I’d enjoy this more if he was here with me—not that I don’t appreciate all this, but...” Harry trailed off, and shook his head. “Sorry. I’m being selfish.”

His two companions exchanged a significant look, one which both confused and unnerved Harry in equal measure. He wanted to ask about it, almost _demand_ what it meant, but at the same time he was afraid to. He didn’t know which parts of his thoughts and reactions came from himself, or from the lives growing inside him.

Harry ate another spoonful of whipped cream, finally clearing it from the top of the drink, and he blew on the steam before he took a small sip. The sharp taste of the bittersweet chocolate washed away the cream that clung to the inside of his mouth, while his opposite hand moved to brush over his flat stomach, and he remembered what Fenrir had said about werewolf pregnancies, and how short they were.

“How long will we be here?” Harry asked suddenly.

“I dunno,” Shannon admitted, “a little while, but not forever, I don’t think—why?”

“Because—because I’m pushing three weeks, and that means I’m almost a quarter way through this pregnancy, and I don’t want Fenrir to miss anything.”

Shannon and Dustin exchanged another look, but this time their expressions looked conflicted. Harry narrowed his eyes at them, but they pretended not to see it.

“Don’t worry, Harry,” Shannon said, reaching across to touch the back of Harry’s hand consolingly. “Everything’s going to be all right, just you wait and see.”

 

~*~

 

Neville woke up slowly that morning, his head filled with cotton, and an unpleasant twinge that reminded him of his time with Ron, Seamus, and Dean the night before. Admittedly he was still a fairly quiet person when not confronted with bullies or Death Eaters, but he tended to sing sea shanties when there was liquor involved, which usually drove off women, instead of the reverse.

Neville generally didn’t mind this so much, despite how frustrating Seamus and Dean found it, as he was still waiting for Luna to get back from her trip before he made any sort of move.

He smiled, his expression almost on the side of goofy as he recalled the last letter she’d sent him. She had told him that she and her father were in Greece now, searching for evidence of the Hydra, which Hermione would often scoff at and proclaim was extinct—not that that deterred Luna at all. That was one of the things that Neville liked best about Luna—her tenacity.

Neville downed a small dose of hangover potion before he drew on his dressing gown and ventured out into the kitchen, where his gran was at the cooker, transferring fried eggs and back bacon to a platter. Her expression had long lost the pinched, sour look it so often bore in his youth—now, she was just grateful that they’d both made it through the war alive, and both with their own Order of Merlins, no less.

“Morning,” Neville offered, holding out his hands for the platter, and she nodded her thanks to him as he transported it to the small kitchen table, where a pot of coffee and platter of toast was waiting.

“Good morning,” his gran replied, nodding her head a little before she moved to the chilled pantry and extracted the butter and marmalade.

She did not speak again until they had both sat down at the table and served themselves, his gran taking her coffee black, while Neville made his with two sugars and milk. He opted just for eggs and toast, while she took only bacon and eggs. It was a familiar, pleasant quiet of the sleepy morning, one that Neville would sorely miss if he ever managed to find a flat of his own.

“What are your plans for today, Neville?” she asked conversationally, while Neville spread a thin layer of butter, followed by marmalade, on his toast.

“I’m going to Diagon Alley to get some food for Trevor, then I’ve got another Order meeting,” Neville replied, pausing to sip his coffee. “If there’s time after, I’m planning on going flat-hunting with Percy Weasley. I’ll do my best to be home in time for dinner, though.”

“Percy, you say?” his gran asked, arching a brow at him. “Not Ron or Ginny?”

“Well, Percy is one of the only people I know who have moved into their own place,” Neville explained. “And he’s dead clever—I figured if I forget to ask something, he’ll be able to help.”

His grandmother nodded approvingly at his reasoning, and went back to her breakfast. In truth, those were not the _only_ reasons he’d asked Percy. Of all the Weasleys, him and George seemed to have taken the loss of Fred the hardest, and Neville thought Percy could use something of a mental break from all the grief. However, saying so to his grandmother, who was a shameless gossip, seemed a little tactless.

Instead, he returned to his breakfast, and the pair ate in silence.

 

Neville’s morning passed without incident, and he got hold of Trevor’s blowflies in a quick, ten-minute trip to Diagon Alley. As his toad snacked on the insects, Neville reluctantly left the house, bidding his gran goodbye as he headed over to Grimmauld Place with a knot in his stomach.

Though he’d never been stupid enough to bring it up to Ron, Hermione, or anyone else in the order, he was beginning to wonder if Harry even _wanted_ to be found. It had been months, no one had seen hide nor hair of him, not even after the Ministry had lifted the warrant for his arrest.

The few lower-down members of the Order had occasionally complained that they couldn’t spend _all_ of their time looking for Harry, but such protests were quickly snuffed out by the others, all of whom desperately wanted to find Harry, especially if he was in the clutches of someone like _Greyback_.

However, Neville was beginning to think it was futile to keep searching. If their theories were true, and Harry _had_ been turned, it was likely that he didn’t want his friends to see him like that—as a beast. True, he knew that not all werewolves were monsters, and Remus had been a fine teacher; he certainly aided Neville in not just his self esteem, but in actually _learning_ things, but still—he had been a werewolf.

Neville knew that many of the more liberal half-blood and muggleborn people in the Order would hate him for thinking that way, but he couldn’t really help it. He’d heard all the nightmarish stories of werewolves growing up, and he’d always believed that the best way to deal with werewolves was to avoid them.

 

The house was busy when Neville finally arrived, with Molly in the kitchen bustling over two overloaded tea trays filled with two pots of tea and some sandwiches, while everyone else was milling about, chatting and catching up.

Neville’s gaze slid across the familiar faces of his former teachers, the unfamiliar ones of the newer members of the Order, and at last to Ron and Hermione, who were already at the dining room table where they held their meetings, poring over maps while they talked quietly with each other.

Hermione smiled when she spotted Neville, and waved him over invitingly. Ron still looked to be a little hungover, but still smiled at him, and sipped some of the water from the goblet in front of him.

“Mum wouldn’t let me have any hangover potion,” he rasped when Neville got closer. “She said something about reaping what I’ve sown, or something like that—I wasn’t really listening.”

“I’d like to hope you’ve learned your lesson about the evils of mixing tequila with everything, but I feel almost like I’d be wasting my time,” Hermione mused, arching a brow at Ron. He grunted, and ignored her.

“I just hope we can get all this bollocks sorted, and we can get Harry back,” Ron grumbled, “I am _so sick_ of this house.”

“But—” Neville began, then quickly shook his head. “No. Never mind.”

“Neville,” Ron said firmly, “spit it out.”

“I just...” Neville trailed off, and sighed. “I mean...after everything, do you think Harry really _wants_ to be found?”

“Of course he does, don’t be stupid,” Ron snapped, earning him a disapproving frown from Hermione for his tone, which he ignored. “Why _wouldn’t_ he want to come home? We’re family.”

“Sometimes family means different things to different people,” Hermione pointed out, “we have no idea what Harry’s going through right now, or what he’s thinking, or feeling. I think _if_ we find him, he might not be the same Harry Potter that we all knew before.”

“What does _that_ mean?” Ron demanded, while Neville winced at the ginger’s cutting tone. He had a feeling his prickly mood had more to do with his hangover than any sort of ill feelings towards Harry, but thankfully, the meeting was called to order before either of them could really amp up their argument.

As with the last few meetings, Professor McGonagall performed a role call, each person responding with, “here,” or raising their hands lazily to announce their presence. Neville didn’t particularly understand what the point of a role call was, but hadn’t bothered to ask—he supposed it was some sort of bureaucratic thing that had no real use, except to show who was and was not attending the meetings.

It went on as so many had before, until McGonagall reached Jones, Hestia.

McGonagall glanced around the room, confusion registering upon her face, and said again, “Hestia? Are you here?”

At the exact same moment, Hestia burst into the house, the door slamming open so hard that she awoke Sirius Black’s mother with a blood-curdling shriek, and for a few moments there was so much commotion that no one knew really what was happening as Hestia staggered into the dining room, hair windblown, and she was panting hard, as though she’d run a great distance.

McGonagall and Arthur Weasley took to the task of shutting Black’s mother up, and when silence once more fell upon the house, all that could be heard was the sound of Hestia’s laboured breathing.

“Hestia?” Molly asked uncertainly, “what’s happened, dear?”

“It’s Potter,” she said between sharp pants, “I’ve found him.”

 


	13. Taken

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Next update is scheduled for November 25th. Please note that I'm taking part in NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) this month, and while it shouldn't interfere with my updates, if there happens to be a late post, I fully blame NaNo :P
> 
> **Content Warning: Violence, Kidnapping**

Chapter Thirteen – Taken

 

Harry rose early in the mornings. He always did, and with the full moon coming, he was extra restless these days. He had been away from the pack for a few weeks, and though he missed the pack—and, of course, Fenrir—oddly, he didn’t miss them as painfully as he thought he might. Mostly, he missed the warmth of Fenrir’s body next to his, and the reassurance that with Fenrir, he would not be going through this pregnancy alone. Fenrir was safety, and warmth, and Harry missed him dearly.

Harry thought often about the _what-ifs_ around the pack, in particular with the way his companions had been uncomfortably vague about when they would return. Oddly, Harry was beginning to find that if Shannon ever told him that they’d _never_ be going back, Harry felt almost as though he’d be okay with that, if it wasn’t for the idea of never seeing Fenrir again. He felt more like himself the longer he was away from the pack, he recognized that Fenrir had been a right foul git those first few weeks, but had long since made up for it, despite a few bumps in the road. Harry knew without the shadow of a doubt what he wanted, and it wasn't to stay in this bloody inn for the rest of his life.

That, and there was one _slight_ change that was making Harry more anxious than ever to get back to his mate.

He’d begun to show.

Harry didn't like being visibly pregnant without Fenrir around to share it with him. Harry had spent one moon pregnant already—pregnant and away from his mate, no less. Harry thought that if Fenrir was around it might take the edge off the weirdness of being both a bloke _and_ pregnant, and though Dustin and Shannon did their best, they were a poor stand-in for Fenrir.

Dustin had found them a safe copse of trees, and they’d spent the moon there. Harry had learnt late that Shannon was _also_ pregnant with Ophelia and Ellette’s new baby sibling, and Shannon had spent the days preceding that moon enthusiastically teaching Harry how to notice the subtle differences in a sub’s scent to find out if they were with child or not—not that Harry had really _cared_ to learn, but he indulged his friend anyway.

Regardless, that lesson paled in comparison to the experience of not just spending a moon as a pregnant wolf, but also without his mate nearby. Harry was exhausted by the pregnancy, and the feeble hunts Dustin was able to make in the small reserve—hardly a forest—meant that they spent the moon hungry, tired, and not in any sort of fit state to run or play; it had been _miserable_.

Now, with the faintly convex indentation of his stomach as well as the coming moon, Harry was awash with longing for Fenrir, and jitters for the impending transformation. Added to that, he still wasn’t completely clear on _why_ they needed to spend so much time away from the pack. Harry both wanted to go back, and didn’t want to. Sure, Fenrir _had_ kidnapped him, he’d be stupid to refuse to admit to that, but he missed things that had nothing to do with Fenrir as well—the sounds of the forest, the way the cubs all hung onto his every word at story time, Xiang’s warm, grandmotherly energy that made Harry feel both protected and cared for in a way that his mate’s presence didn’t—it was so many things, and it had become _home_ for him.

So why was he here, and not there?

As Harry lay there, watching their breakfast materialize on their little dining table as it did every morning, and made a mental note to get some sort of proper answer from his companions today. It wasn’t fair that they were being all weird and secretive, and he wasn’t some stupid kid. If he was old enough to be Alpha Bitch of the pack, old enough to be Fenrir’s mate, and bear his children, he was damn well old enough to be in on their stupid plans.

Harry's gaze shifted to Shannon, and he glared at his friend. Like himself, he could see that Shannon's belly was beginning to show signs of a pregnancy, though on a man with so strong a frame, it looked more than a little odd. At times, it was hard to believe that Shannon was actually a sub like him.

Harry got up with a little sigh, drew on his dressing gown, and headed out into the main area of the inn to take his tea in the sun room.

 

All the other guests who were milling about the space were still in their pyjamas, just as Harry was. It was a mishmash of English and foreign holidaymakers, most of whom were dressed in terrycloth dressing gowns that looked scratchy and uncomfortable, at least compared to the nice flannel one that Harry had on.

Harry helped himself to a cup of tea off one of the platters that had been served, and sat in the armchair nearest to the large bay window. It looked out on the London skyline in the distance, but the misty rain that was sprinkling outside had doused London in a heavy, muggy fog.

 

Suddenly, the back of Harry's neck seemed to prickle, as though he was being watched.

Harry whirled around, his eyes scanning the assembly of sleepy guests, but no one seemed out of place. His free hand brushed the end of his new wand— _Elder and werewolf hair, 11_ _½ inches, good for defensive magic_ —which Dustin had bought him in Diagon Alley the week before. Harry was grateful; both for the wand, and for Dustin's forethought to transfigure his appearance beforehand when they'd gone to collect it. He didn't want anyone to recognize him in the Alley, especially not someone he knew, like Ron or Hermione. He wanted to see them again, but not yet—not when there were still too many questions to be answered.

_How would they even react, knowing who my mate is?_ Harry wondered as he recalled the day in Diagon Alley, and his worries that he might run into one or both of his best friends.

The thought came to him for the hundredth time while his eyes continued to dart around the room, looking for anything out of place, but still he found nothing. Despite this, the uneasy feeling did not fade.

Something was wrong; he couldn't see it, but he could definitely feel it.

His tea virtually untouched, Harry got up and walked leisurely towards the doors, intending to head back to his room. Unfortunately, his path to the doors was quickly intercepted by a witch, one he didn't know.

“Hey, you're Harry Potter, ain't'cha?” she asked, in what Harry viewed as a very bad impression of an American accent. “I saw in them papers that you're s'posed to be missin'.”

“I'm here with friends,” Harry said evasively, his neck once more prickling with negation. Something felt _very_ wrong about this encounter, though Harry still wasn't sure exactly _what_. “Excuse me, please, I need to get back to them or they'll worry.”

“Hey, now, don't be rude,” she accused, “I ain't gonna _hurt_ ya. I just want my sister to meetcha. She's a _real_ big fan of you English celebrities.”

She reached out to grab his wrist, and Harry lurched out of her hold, whipping out his wand to point it at her, while his opposite hand moved to cover his stomach protectively.

“Do _not_ touch me,” Harry warned, his eyes narrowing a little.

The woman's eyes widened in shock, but before she could respond, Harry had darted out of the space, and raced down the hall towards his room.

 

When Harry burst in, he found both Shannon and Dustin halfway though breakfast, and their eyes widened when they saw Harry.

“We need to go,” Harry panted, “now.”

Both Shannon and Dustin exchanged a look, but their reactions were far too slow—and far less alarmed than they should be. Harry couldn't quite explain it, even to himself, but he simply _knew_ that they needed to leave, and leave quickly.

“Harry?” Shannon asked, standing up slowly, and he approached him cautiously. “What's wrong?”

“We need to go,” Harry repeated. “Please. I want to go, we _need_ to go.”

“Where would you like to go?”

“Home?” Harry asked, his voice cracking a little. “Can we please go home?”

“Love, we can't go home, not yet,” Shannon said, clearly in a tone that he had intended to be soothing, but Harry wasn't having it, not this time.

“Why _not_?” Harry demanded angrily, his voice jumping up in volume, and making his friend's eyes widen in alarm. “ _Why_ can't we go home? I want to see Fenrir, I want to sleep in _my_ bed, with _my_ mate. Sure, this has been a right fucking holiday for you two, but I am here alone, _without_ Fenrir. I _want_ to see him.”

“We—we can't,” Shannon stammered, his nervousness now visibly apparent. Harry bared his teeth in a very wolfish sign of warning.

“Give me one reason—one _real_ reason why the hell not,” Harry snapped, clenching his hands into fists. “Your mate is right _there,”_ Harry pointed at Dustin for emphasis. “Mine is faraway, and I _want_ to see him. I'm showing, and I'm _not_ having him miss it. Do you get that?”

Dustin laid a gentle hand on Shannon's arm just as he opened his mouth to respond, and he ushered his mate back a little, and murmured something to him. Harry strained his ears, but only caught bits of what they were saying, when crammed together made little sense to Harry. _Showing no signs, from what I've read, he just wants to go home, if you weren't with child, he'd probably kill you..._

Well, most of it made no sense at least. They weren't exactly _wrong_ on the latter part, anyway.

“Okay,” Dustin said at last, “get your stuff, Harry, and we'll get out of here.”

Relieved, Harry grabbed his wand and used it to pack the three of them up in a matter of seconds. Dustin and Shannon both laughed at Harry's enthusiasm, and allowed the sub to lead the way to the reception desk to sign out, Harry all but bouncing the whole way.

_Finally,_ he was going home.

Harry stepped out of the inn first, intending to Apparate straight back to the pack, but something stopped him dead in his tracks the moment he'd crossed the threshold.

Though it was supposed to be mid-morning, outside of the inn seemed strangely dark, as though midnight had descended at the wrong time of day.

Before Harry could remark on it, a hand clapped over his mouth, and a strangled cry escaped him as a voice began to hiss to him, though the words were so rushed that Harry had a hard time making them out. The voice was almost familiar, but in his current state of alarm, Harry couldn't place it. Panic blinded everything else as he bit down on the hand, hard enough to break the skin and fill Harry's mouth with human blood, and his would-be captor cried out in both surprise and pain.

Dustin and Shannon rushed out, their eyes wide, and more cloaked figures circled them, going for Shannon first, as he was biggest by a large margin. Harry screamed in horror as he watched a flash of light hit his fellow sub, and he crumpled to the ground.

Dustin let out a snarl of anger, and rushed the closest wizard. He went for the wizard's throat, teeth bared, but no longer were they human teeth in Dustin's mouth, but some grotesque mixture of wolf and man.

The wizard screamed in terror, but Harry did not see what befell Dustin, the stranger, or Shannon, as the person who held him grabbed him tightly with his uninjured hand, murmured _Incarceous,_ binding his wrists and ankles, as well as gagging and blindfolding him before he was whisked away in a painful twist of Apparition.

 

~*~

 

Fenrir was fighting again.

He knew Marie would kill him for fighting when his broken wrist has been healed less than an hour ago, but he didn't really care all that much. The weeks without his mate had been rough— _beyond rough._ It was a miracle he hadn't rushed out to go and get Harry the second Shannon and Dustin had snuck off with him.

And, of course, his mood was made all that much worse by how _chipper_ Caomh had been these last weeks, making it even more apparent how much his son hated his mate.

_I'd really beat him down if he wouldn't whine so much about it after,_ Fenrir thought with annoyance. _He is like the worst parts of me and Lukas all rolled into one._

Fenrir cracked his opponent across the jaw, effectively distracting himself from his own thoughts, and old Shane crumpled to the ground with a grunt of pain. Some warrior he was.

As Fenrir turned, looking for another dom to take him on, a sharp _crack_ of Apparition filled the air, making a few of the subs cry out, and some of the children scream in surprise.

“Alpha? _Alpha!_ ” someone screamed, their voice desperate, and close to tears. “Alpha, _help!_ ”

Dustin.

Fenrir tore from the ring, and followed Dustin's screams. He was alone, and he was supporting an unconscious Shannon. Blood was dripping down from a small wound on his temple, and the dom was as white as a sheet.

“Get Marie!” Fenrir barked at one of the bystanders, and two of the subs pelted off towards the healer's cabin, while out of the corner of his eye, he say Xiang trying to hold Shannon and Dustin's two daughters back. Fenrir took a small breath to steady himself, and refocused his attention on the terrified dominant. “Dustin, where's Harry? What happened?”

“Taken,” Dustin choked out. “Harry came back to our room at the inn, not even half an hour ago, and he was really upset. He wanted to come home. I don't know why he was so agitated, all he would say is that he wanted to come home and see you.

“We left,” Dustin continued, his voice shaking as he tried to get the words out in the right order. “It wasn't even eleven o'clock, but it was dark outside, and we were jumped by wizards. They attacked Shannon, and he fell. I went after one of the other wizards before I noticed that another one had grabbed Harry, but before I could do anything he was gone. I ran with Shannon, I didn't know what to do. Alpha, I'm so sorry.”

Dustin was trembling, and his eyes were shiny with tears. He looked terrified, both for his mate, and for Harry.

“Get your mate to the healer's cabin,” Fenrir grunted. “And tell me _exactly_ where you were staying.”

“T-the _Bread and Breakfast_ inn, just outside of London,” Dustin replied at once. “Do you know who took him?”

“My guess is either the Ministry, or his Order people,” Fenrir replied with another growl of anger. He _really_ wanted to blame Dustin for all this, but it was clear who really was at fault—himself, for ever letting Harry go in the first place.

“Xavier, Sheehan!” he barked, calling the two dominants forward. “You two are coming with me. We're tracking Harry's kidnappers, and we'll kill _anyone_ who gets in our way. Anaïs is in charge, and I want _no_ arguments,” Fenrir glared pointedly at Caomh, who had already opened his mouth to protest his mate's involvement. “Let's go.”

The three dominants clasped hands, and disappeared with another sharp _crack_.

 

~*~

 

An unpleasant smell filled Harry's nose.

Fear, sweat, and humans—a _lot_ of humans in a small space.

“ _Molly!_ ” a male voice barked, “ _we got him!”_

“Let me go!” Harry tried to scream, struggling against his bindings, but the gag in his mouth made the words come out muffled and indistinct. He let out a cry of anger, thrashing against the wizard, but he held tight to Harry, and would not let him go.

A thunderous sound filled the space of many footsteps, clearly more than one or two people, and he heard a woman scream.

“Why is he bound, gagged, and blindfolded?” a female voice demanded angrily, but this one Harry recognized.

Hermione.

“Don't be such a fool, Granger,” snapped Harry's captor. “He's a wolf now. He needs to be restrained and added to the registry—”

“ _Registry!_ ” Hermione shrieked, her voice heavy with disgust.

“You can't do that!” another voice cried—Ron.

“He's still Harry!” a third voice added—Neville?

That last one Harry hadn't quite expected, and his confusion jumbled into his mind along with the blind panic and protective instincts for his unborn children. He needed his _mate,_ not these humans.

“Oh,” another voice said, Molly Weasley's tone adding to the cacophony of noise, though she sounded oddly subdued compared to the more urgent voices that surrounded him. “Quick—get him up to the master bedroom, and I'll call Poppy so we can find out exactly what that _beast_ did to him...”

Ron, Hermione, and Neville continued to shout, spewing profanities at the older adults as they carried Harry away, who was still struggling violently.

Harry was tossed onto something soft, and he let out another snarl as he felt his captors tie him down spreadeagled onto the bed. He lurched up, his forehead hitting something hard, and someone cried out in pain.

“You little _beast!_ ” a voice screamed, and Harry heard another loud commotion.

“Leave him alone!” another voice shouted, and Harry let out a moan of discontent. His inner wolf was _not enjoying_ this chaos, and his exposed and vulnerable position was making his panic even worse.

“I'll do the examination!” a deep voice suddenly proclaimed, one which Harry almost didn't recognize as Kingsley in its heightened, alarmed state. “Poppy is taking too long, and we need to ensure that Harry is all right! Quiet, quiet!”

Harry let out another wolfish snarl, thrashing against his bindings, momentarily forgetting about his gag as he tried to snap at Kingsley, who, as far as Harry knew, had no medical training whatsoever.

Silence fell in the space, but it was not a peaceful, comfortable quiet. Harry was still struggling, growling, and snarling, and despite his lack of sight, he could feel and smell that there was at least half a dozen humans gathered around him.

“Goodness,” Molly said, “what _has_ that monster done to you, Harry?” The woman sounded close to tears, and Harry growled again at the insult directed at his mate. “Well, at least he's been feeding you properly, not like that irresponsible, good-for-nothing—”

“—Molly,” another female voice interjected, her stern tone voice heavy with warning.

“That's not fat,” Kingsley said at the same time, his voice aghast, as though he'd been suddenly witness to a massacre.

“Kingsley?”

“He's...he's...”

“My god, man, spit it out.”

“Get the children out of here,” Kingsley said, ignoring the question.

“We're not going anywhere, and we're _not_ children!” Ron shouted angrily. “Harry's our friend, not some rabid dog. Tell us what's going on!”

“Oh, Kingsley, if that's what I think it is, don't you _dare!_ ” Hermione shrieked. “You _can't_! They're innocent little—”

“—that will _do,_ Miss Granger!”

“Bollocks _that will do!_ ” Hermione screamed. “I know that look! I've seen it hundreds of times over the last year! This is not _for the greater good!_ Harry is out of his head with fright, in a strange place his wolf doesn't recognize, and if you do this, he'll never trust us again!”

“He's a _werewolf,_ you silly girl!” another voice snapped. “Who gives a damn what he wants?”

“ _We do!_ ” shouted Ron, Hermione, and Neville at the same time.

“He's Harry Potter!” Hermione cried.

“He's the sodding Boy Who Lived!” Ron added.

“The _Chosen One!_ ” Neville cried. “If Hermione's hinting to what I think you're gonna do, you _can't_! It's not your decision to make!”

“ _Get them out of here!_ ” Kingsley snarled, his voice almost completely unfamiliar to Harry as he shouted. “If no one else has the guts to save Harry from himself, then by the Gods above and below, I will do it _myself_.”

 


	14. Devastation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Next update will be December 9th, and that post (chapter fifteen) will be the last update before the holidays. Chapter Sixteen will be up on January 6th. I'm really sorry for the massive delay, but I have no internet at home, and trying to find time during the holidays to post is really tough, so it's easier on me to just wait until the holidays are over. Just to reiterate: This is not the last pre-holiday update, the next one will be. 
> 
> **Trigger Warning: This chapter contains violence, implied future character death, discriminatory language, references of forced sterilization, and nonconsensual abortion.**

Chapter Fourteen – Devastation

 

“You _can't!”_ Hermione screamed, while Neville and Ron both let out shouts of anger at this proclamation at the same time. How could these people be so _stupid?_ Neville didn't understand it at _all._

“It's not your place to decide that for Harry!” Neville protested, while Ron cried his agreement.

“We just brought down a psychotic dark wizard who killed, tortured, and imprisoned people just for being what they are!” Ron added angrily. “How can you even _think_ about doing this to Harry, your _hero_?”

“Enough!” Molly screeched, and Harry let out a muffled cry from the bed, squirming and thrashing, and to Neville's horror, he saw that Kingsley was already pushing up Harry's jumper, and exposing his faintly distended stomach. “You three are being utterly ridiculous! Have you forgotten who the other father of those little _beasts_ are? What he has done, the lives he has ruined? Do you think Harry would really want this, were he in his right mind? That monster, Greyback, has poisoned the mind of your friend, someone who I consider as good as a _son._ He would not want this, or those _things_ growing inside him. Greyback has destroyed his manhood, made him into a woman, and perverted him. It's _disgusting!”_

Molly let out a sputter of disgust following her rant, while she began to herd Neville, Hermione, and Ron towards the door. On the bed, Harry continued to cry out in protest, his tears dampening his blindfold, and his screams just barely muffled by the gag in his mouth.

“ _No!_ ” Hermione cried, planting her feet firmly on the floor, and refused to move. “I will _not_ let you do this to Harry! You're doing something you have _no right_ to decide for him, can't you see that? _Harry_ should be the one deciding if he wants to keep his baby, _not you_.” Hermione glared at the older woman, and withdrew her wand, which made Molly sputter angrily.

“Oh, would you stop being a silly little girl and just _step outside!_ ” Molly shrieked, her face turning red as she pulled out her own wand, but before any of the three could say a word Molly waved it, and with a cry of shock, all three of them were thrown bodily from the room.

Hermione did not even pause the moment they landed upon the ground in a heap, but sprang up, still clutching her wand, and whipped it in the direction of the door, which had been slammed shut following their expulsion, but the spell that she cast merely bounced off the wood, barely missing the trio as it collided with a vase of flowers in the hall, and exploded.

“No, _no!_ ” Hermione screamed, tears welling in her eyes as she pounded on the door and let out guttural, nonsensical shrieks as she pleaded for them not to do this.

“Neville, come on,” Ron said urgently, grabbing Neville's wrist and dragging him to his feet. “We need backup. _Now._ ”

Neville understood immediately, but faltered at who to contact. Everyone Harry was close with was either dead or here already—and contacting former classmates at random seemed a bad idea.

Ron had already gone on ahead, and Neville could hear that Ron was using the downstairs fire to contact the Burrow, and anyone who would come. As he did so, a sudden idea came to Neville in a flash of genius.

Neville ran into the library where one of the other Floo fires resided, and he tossed in a handful of glittering powder as he cried, “Berne, Switzerland, Luna Lovegood!” Neville paused, and when he was certain that connection was made, he called out, “Luna? Are you there? Harry's in _big_ trouble and we need your help!”

Neville had expected Luna's head to pop into the fire and ask him what sort of trouble, but thankfully she seemed to have cottoned on to the urgency in his voice, and a moment later she tumbled out of the fire, dressed in a pink sundress and black tights, her hair falling around her shoulders like sunkissed wheat, and a small smudge of soot on her nose. She was barefoot, and her feet were very red.

“Hello, Neville,” she said in her familiar bright and ethereal voice, “I'm sorry, you caught me on a snow-hike, and SnowStars are afraid of boots. What's happened to Harry?”

“ _Long_ story,” he said, waving for her to follow him in the direction of the screaming. Half the Weasley children were already outside the door when they joined them, with shields seemingly made out of the covers of metal rubbish bins, and were alternately shouting profanities and hexes at the door. “But we need all the help we can get—the adults in this bloody house have all _completely_ gone mad, and—”

“What on _earth_ is going on here?”

The voice was familiar, and the tone of it made Neville's blood run cold. It had been a long time since he'd heard McGonagall sound so angry, and the small group all turned as one towards their former professor, only to find that she was not alone. Madam Pomfrey was standing at her side, equally as perplexed by the scene as the older woman was.

“Professor,” Hermione said tearfully, “Mrs Weasley and Kingsley have gone _mad_! Th-they're going to hurt Harry, he's pregnant and they're taking the babies out without his permission and—and we tried to stop them but Mrs Weasley wouldn't listen to us and now we can't get back in, and—”

“Out of my way, Miss Granger,” said Pomfrey, “that is completely—oh, what are they thinking! Harry is still Harry, regardless what species he is. Have they forgotten that he has _rights_? _Body autonomy?_ Out of the way, you lot, before something terrible happens!”

Charlie, George, and Ginny shouted their approval, and Neville was certain that he spotted a small, rare smile upon McGonagall's lips as they all hurriedly made space for the two women, and they promptly blasted open the door as though it was made out of paper.

Quiet descended as the group of nine looked into the room, and the horrific scene it contained. Even Neville's ordinary human nose could smell the blood.

“Bloody _hell_ ,” said Ron.

“What have you done?” said Luna, her normally airy-fairy voice gone, and overlaid with a deep anguish.

“Oh _no_ ,” Hermione said, her voice catching, and she bowed forward as she began to weep.

They were too late.

 

~*~

 

Harry lay still.

The pain was mostly gone, but for once that was not a good thing.

His blindfold was wet with tears, and his mouth tasted of blood from all his screaming.

 

“Kingsley, what have you done?”

The voice was familiar, but the soft, aghast tone made it almost unrecognizable to Harry—Pomfrey.

What had Kingsley done?

Why couldn't Harry stop him?

Wasn't accidental magic supposed to _prevent_ things like this?

Harry whined softly, more tears coming to his eyes as he once more recalled the horrifying thing that had occurred—the murder of his children. He recalled how the soft sounds his cubs made had been snuffed out, and he hadn't been able to stop it; that soft, feeble wheezing of two werewolf cubs being torn from the womb too soon, then killed before Harry's veiled eyes.

At least he hadn't had to see it, but hearing and feeling it had been just as agonizing.

“What we had to do,” Molly said, her tone firm, and the two other culprits, Hestia Jones and Dedalus Diggle, both vocalised their agreement. “We were saving him from himself—we took out those little _parasites_ , and removed his womb. We didn't want to risk anyone else hurting him.”

“Oh, did you now?” Pomfrey asked, her voice carrying a lilt of amusement to it. “Well, thank goodness we have an expert on werewolf anatomy on the premises—I have no idea how we'd cope without you, Molly.”

“And _what_ does that mean?”

“It means get out of here so that I might reverse any damage you may have done to this poor boy,” Pomfrey snapped. Harry heard no one move, closely followed by the faint rustle of fabric, like those present were shifting uncomfortably. Quickly, Madam Pomfrey lost her patience as she shouted, “was I speaking Swahili? _Out, now!_ ”

Harry heard a loud commotion, and he whined as he squirmed on the bed, while the horrifically burned skin on his wrists and ankles from the bindings aching like salt had been rubbed into the wounds. At the same time, he heard Pomfrey add, “Miss Granger, would you mind assisting me? I need a second wand if Harry gets agitated, and your female and familiar scent will hopefully calm him.”

“Oh, er...all right,” Hermione said uncertainly. “I won't scare him?”

“Honestly, at this stage, I think he is too frightened to feel much of anything.”

“Oh, _Harry_ ,” Hermione said, and Harry let out a whine when he heard the human begin to weep. He didn't like the sound.

“Now everyone who isn't Harry or Hermione— _out._ Molly and Kingsley, you both would do well to leave the house—”

“—is that a threat, Miss Pomfrey?” Molly demanded, her voice high with righteous indignation. “We were helping Harry in your stead—”

“—helping! _Ha!_ ” Pomfrey cried, “it is no threat, Molly, but I am thinking that is only a matter of time until Harry's mate tracks him down, and when he does, I doubt he will pause long enough to _reason_ with the kidnappers of his sub.”

The mere mention of his mate made Harry whine, and the wolfish sound seemed to remind Molly just who Harry's mate was, and she suddenly rushed from the room, her scent fading as she barked at her children to evacuate the house, as though it had suddenly burst into flames.

“Ah, some peace at last,” Pomfrey said. “Miss Granger, please remove his bindings, and I shall see how much damage those monsters did to him...”

“Oh, okay...” Hermione replied, her voice soft and uncharacteristically uncertain.

Harry listened to his friend shift closer, smelt her approach, but despite his efforts to brace himself for what was to come, he still flinched when he felt the human touch him. The blindfold was removed, and his eyes were flooded with the dim light from the gas lamps and afternoon sunshine that leaked in from the edges of the curtained window, but his eyes still stung from it.

“Harry, what happened to your glasses?” Hermione asked, her curiosity bleeding through as she removed his gag, tossing the rope aside carelessly, then used her wand to removed the bonds from his wrists and ankles. Part of Harry guessed that she was trying to force some normalcy into the situation, but when Harry tried to speak, all that escaped him was a wolflike moan, as though his human voice was not up to working properly.

“He likely doesn't need them any longer,” Pomfrey said, from Harry's other side, speaking softly, as though she was trying to keep from startling him. Harry whimpered a little, curling up the moment he was free, but a sharp pain lanced through his abdomen, and he gasped. “Werewolf venom has incredible restorative properties, eliminating diseases, regenerating lost limbs and organs, but it is also highly contagious, and so cannot be used in Wizard Healing.”

“Restorative...” Hermione murmured, while Harry stared at her blankly as the shock over what had happened once more began to assert itself. Harry heard the words around him, but he couldn't understand much of them. His babies were gone. He'd failed Fenrir. What did it matter now if he ever got back to the pack? At least these particular humans seemed trustworthy—and they smelt safe, too. “Does that mean there's a chance of reversing...what they did?”

“To a point, yes,” Pomfrey replied, her wand ghosting over Harry's form, but never touching him. “His organs will regrow within one month—he'll need at least one moon in order to grow them back, but the pregnancy...it is lost. No power on this earth can raise the dead like that.”

“Oh, Harry...” Hermione said, her voice becoming weak and anguished again. “I'm so sorry. We were trying to help you, we thought Greyback was hurting you, and impregnating you at all is questionable, but I _know_ you, and I _know_ you'd never have the heart to terminate a pregnancy, regardless who the father—er, other father was.”

Harry saw Hermione glance up and look towards his opposite side—towards Pomfrey. It seemed as though they were having some sort of silent conversation, but Harry didn't care to find out what it was. His babies were gone—there was nothing he cared about anymore.

Harry let out a low moan, a lupine whine that seemed to snap Hermione back to the present, and she tentatively pet Harry's sweat-soaked hair, her eyes still shiny with tears.

“Oh, H-Harry, it's okay,” she said, her voice shaking. “It's all going to be okay, I promise.”

Harry didn't believe her, but he saw no point in speaking. His screaming had done nothing, so why would his words make any difference?

“Harry,” Pomfrey said from his other side, “it seems as though Kingsl— _he_ tried to heal your wounds by cauterizing them, and I need to fix his mistake to ensure that there are no complications or infections, all right? This may be uncomfortable, but it will not hurt.”

Harry did not respond beyond a faint inclination of his head, and Hermione whimpered again, as though she wanted to cry, but was just barely holding herself back.

Harry could feel the faint tickling of a healing spell rush through him. The pain mostly vanished, dimming from a sharp, searing pain to a dull throbbing ache, like a healing bruise. Harry did not like the uncomfortable _human_ element that the magic seemed to have, and it reminded him of the metallic aftertaste certain muggle drugs used to give him, on the off-chance that it was bad enough for the Dursleys to bring him to hospital.

Harry abruptly grappled for the memories of his childhood, for the quiet moments when he wasn't being yelled at, chased by his cousin, or walloped by his uncle. They felt safe, almost comforting.

They didn't hurt half as much as his life right now.

He drifted, only vaguely away of day passing into night, and the next morning dawning around him, while tears streamed from his eyes almost continually as he recalled his cubs' first and final moments. He'd heard them, he'd smelt them—his babies. Little gasping sounds of lungs too small and not ready for air. The sharp scent of twin boys. _His boys_.

Harry bowed his head forward, and positively screamed with misery.

Harry heard the door fly open, and a flurry of sound came with it, along with the gentle smells of human females.

Hermione pet his hair as Harry continued to scream, unmoving, save for the high pitched wails that tore from his throat. The female smell did not really bother him, like a human male's might have, but Hermione's anguish for him was almost palpable, and it made everything uncomfortable, like an itchy wool jumper.

Harry choked, and his screams abruptly cut off. Hermione was ushered away, despite her loud protests, and Harry heard the sharp hiss of someone speaking to her softly, but urgently, clearly in a tone that Harry was not supposed to overhear, and yet he caught every syllable.

“ _You can't forget who Harry has tied himself to,”_ the voice said, “ _Harry is no monster, he's just a boy, but his supposed mate will tear this house apart, plank by plank, to get Harry back, we need to prepare...”_

Harry felt his breath still.

Fenrir.

_Is Fenrir here?_ Harry wondered, _Has he come to rescue me from this prison? Wouldn't I have smelt him by now?_

Harry got up on shaky, weak legs, and stumbled soundlessly to the window. Certainly if he was human, he would not have managed to walk at all, after what was done to him, but his werewolf pain tolerance was a blessing, and he managed to make it to the window—but barely.

He peered outside hopefully, and his heart immediately fell. The street was empty, save for a few muggle pedestrians.

Disappointed, Harry staggered back to bed, while he tried to come up with a plan.

Fenrir was coming, Harry could sense it.

Hell, he could practically _taste_ it.

All he needed now was a way to escape from the humans before they could hurt his mate.

If _any_ of these humans touched Fenrir...

Harry's fingers clenched around the edge of the duvet, tightly enough that they turned white.

He wasn't going to let _anything_ else happen to the people he loved.

In the quiet of the room, Harry began to plan.

 

~*~

 

The little inn that Dustin had described smelt strongly of Harry, and of his fear.

This only made Fenrir angrier, which, in turn, made it harder to focus and follow the scent of the Apparition. The acrid, human magic scent was leading straight into London, but it was not as strong as Harry's had been on the night he'd tailed his mate for the first time, making it harder to follow, and by extension, made him even more ill-tempered when night fell around them, and their second day was already starting to wane.

“Alpha?” a tentative voice said, and he turned around to see Xavier gazing back at him, eyes alight with concern.

“What?” Fenrir demanded, his voice close to a snap, and the young dominant winced.

“I—I just want to say, I'm sorry.”

“Sorry?”

“About Caomh,” he explained tentatively. “I just want you to know...I don't share his feelings about Alpha Harry. None of us do. He's special, and we just want our Alpha Bitch back, so I promise to do my best to help you when we find him.”

“I don't doubt it,” Fenrir said with a grunt, and Xavier smiled. “My son can be a stupid shithead—he's emotional and needy, but you humble him. When— _If_ you two choose to mate, you don't need to ask for my permission, you already have it.”

“Really?” the fellow dom asked, his face brightening into a wide, joyous smile.

“We can talk about this _after_ ,” Fenrir said firmly. “We need to get Harry and the cubs he's carrying home safely first. We can discuss you and my son after.”

“Deal,” Xavier replied, the silly smile never leaving his face.

The Apparition scent led the trio deeper into London, but veered away from the glitz and glamour that the city was generally known for, and to the dirty, dangerous back-alleys a walking distance from King's Cross.

Fenrir's stomach clenched in unpleasant fear, an almost unfamiliar emotion to him as he tried to stay focused, and not allow his mind to flood with worry for his mate. Who had taken his Harry? Surely the Order or Ministry had no use in locking him up in some hovel? What on earth was going _on_?

They turned onto another street, some dirty, seedy area called _Grimmauld Place_.

Here, Harry's scent was stronger, but oddly muted in a way that told Fenrir he was probably behind some sort of warding. This, at least, confirmed that some scumbag wizards had him.

Scumbag wizards who weren't likely to live through the night.

Fenrir gritted his teeth, anger making his vision swim for a moment, just as one of his companions clapped him on the arm.

“Alpha, _look!_ ” Sheehan cried, and Fenrir's gaze whipped in the direction his son was pointing.

Number Eleven and Number Thirteen of Grimmauld Place seemed to be wavering, like heat across a desert expanse.

Like a ward that was breaking.

Suddenly, Harry burst out of the space at a stumbling run, his face pale, and Fenrir noticed several things in quick succession.

First, Harry looked terrified. He was white as a sheet, and seemed to be struggling to walk. He had to grab the iron-wrought fence of Number Eleven to even stay on his feet.

Second, he heard several shouts, muffled by the warding, and Harry's awkward gait picked up, despite the fact that it seemed to hurt for him to do so.

Third, his scent was different. It took him a moment for Fenrir to pinpoint a difference over the acrid, human stink of the city, but when he noticed it, he felt positively sick.

It was the scent of _Just Harry_ , not _Pregnant Harry_.

_Oh, Sweet Moon._

Horror struck Fenrir as he raced forward, and gathered an openly weeping Harry into his arms.

“I'm here, pet, I'm here,” he said as Harry continued to cry, grappling at his bare chest as he positively howled with misery.

“Fen—they took them— _they killed them—_ K-Kingsley, Hestia, M-M-Molly, Dedalus. I-I d-don't know who else was there, but _they did it_. _They took our babies._ ”

“Point them out to me when they cross the warding barrier,” Fenrir murmured. “I'll kill them and bring you their heads. I'll kill them _all_.”

“Don't hurt my friends—the ones my age, or the redheaded twentysomethings, or McGonagall, or Pomfrey. They helped. They put me as right as they could, and wouldn't let _them_ near me.”

Fenrir knew McGonagall and Pomfrey. Given their history with Lupin, it didn't wholly surprise him that they would try to protect him.

A small group of wizards with wands burst through the warding, closely followed by one Harry's age—a girl with frizzy brown hair.

“ _Greyback!_ ” she called, startling the older adults so much that they all skidded to a stop, and she pelted a wand, point first, directly at the alpha wolf.

“ _It's Harry's!_ ” she shouted when he'd caught it deftly, “ _please, keep him safe!_ ”

“Some friend you've got there,” Fenrir said with a smirk, and pressed the silly stick into Harry's hands, and he smiled meekly up at his mate. “Show me the murderers, and then I want you to scarper. You're not getting caught in the middle of this.”

Though Harry didn't argue, the difference from before was tangible. His expression was set, but angry, like he wanted to do some _real_ damage, but in his current state, couldn't. His legs shook, and he clutched onto Fenrir to keep himself standing, and pointed out three adults.

“Hestia, Kingsley, Deladeus,” Harry said, pointing them out with a few quick nods of his head, which was smart, Fenrir thought—there was less of a chance that the wizards would know what's coming that way. “I don't know where Molly went. She's...er... _big_ , you know? And loud, and ginger. You can't miss her, plus, she'll probably try to kill you.”

Fenrir wanted to ask about how bloodthirsty Harry sounded; he wanted to know if he should be concerned about it, despite the rage he felt pooling in his own gut over what these monsters had done to his mate and unborn children. He never once doubted that these wizards deserved death, but Harry had never struck him as relishing the killing of a human—not even Voldemort.

Fenrir stopped only long enough to kiss Harry firmly upon the mouth, his little friend throwing up a shield charm of some kind to stop the wizards from openly attacking, and the human seemed to be smiling as she did it, though it was too far for Fenrir to tell, especially when most of his focus was trained upon his distraught mate.

“Go,” Fenrir said roughly, and nudged Harry towards Xavier. “I'll fight better knowing that you're out of harm's way.”

“Be safe, come back to me in one piece,” Harry said, and opened his mouth to say more, but at the same moment, the shield charm failed, and hexes began to fly in their direction. Despite Harry's fatigue, he threw up a shield charm of his own, protecting them, and Fenrir smirked proudly. Even weakened, Harry was strong.

“ _Go,_ ” Fenrir said firmly. “I will see you back at the territory, and we'll sort everything out, I promise.”

“You better come back,” Harry said, his eyes narrowing a little as he spoke.

“Pet, you know I'll always come home to you,” Fenrir retorted with a wry smile. “Now, _go_.”

Thankfully, Xavier obeyed, Disapparating before Harry could try and carry on the conversation. Honestly, his mate had the _worst_ fucking timing for wanting to have a heart-to-heart.

Fenrir glanced over to his son, and the blond smirked.

“Ready, Dad?” he asked, and Fenrir responded with a wicked, toothy grin.

“Vengeance is so sweet.”

As one, the pair turned towards their incoming attackers, and transformed.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Just a few things of note, which I'm putting here to clear the air a bit, and so that I won't spoil the chapter for those lovely people who read author's notes in full.
> 
> I didn't include the tag of “forced sterilization” in the tags of the actual fic because it's pretty much resolved in the same scene, so it seemed unnecessary to include it like that. 
> 
> To anyone wondering, “but what about trans werewolves who surgically augment their body, or male subs or female werewolves who want their tubes tied?” that did occur to me, and it will be addressed in the following chapters.
> 
> Lastly, I promise that I have not forgotten about Remus, and he will be making an appearance soon. :) Thank you guys for reading, and I'll see you all on the 9th :)


	15. Aftershocks

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: This is the LAST pre-holiday update. Next update will be January 6th. 
> 
> Thank you guys so, so much, especially for your support on the previous chapter. I was really nervous about how it would be received because that particular topic is something I've never seen in fanfiction before, and because it's such a sensitive subject, it's always hard to tell how people will react to it. So, again, thank you guys for your comments and support, please enjoy this update, and keep a weather-eye on my feed, because though this is the last pre-holiday update for this fic, I do have a couple Christmas oneshots in the works for a few different ships. Everyone have a safe and happy season, and I'll see you all in the new year! ^.^

Chapter Fifteen – Aftershocks

 

When Harry and Xavier reappeared in the territory, the first person they saw was—unfortunately—Caomh.

“ _Get off him!_ ” Caomh snarled, pushing Harry away from his courting mate roughly. Under normal circumstances, the push wouldn't be much to Harry, but in his weakened state, it was enough to knock him over, and he landed with a gasp of pain.

Caomh ignored Harry completely as he got back up on shaky legs, too busy fretting over his mate to notice or care. Xavier looked uncertain and afraid, and for a long moment Xavier appeared to have no idea what to do before he seemed to snap back to reality, and placed a gentle, but firm hand on Caomh's arm.

“Baby, Alpha Harry needs to see a healer,” he said, his voice hard, and all but daring Caomh to protest. “We'll talk later.”

Without waiting for Caomh's response, Xavier gently nudged past his stunned courting mate as he helped Harry walk through the small copse of trees and along the edge of the cliffside, managing to avoid any of the other pack members as they made their way to the healer's cabin.

This made Harry feel both guilty and relieved at the same time. Though he had been dying to get back to the pack and see everyone again, after everything that happened he could do with a break in the chaos.

As they stepped inside, Dustin whipped around, dropping Shannon's hand, and his entire body seemed to relax upon seeing the pack's Alpha Bitch.

“Oh, thank god for Alpha's tracking abilities,” Dustin said with a sigh as he stood up and hurried over to the pair. “Harry, are you all right?”

Harry opened his mouth, intending to reassure the dominant who had taken care of him these last weeks, but then he remembered what had happened, and what he'd lost.

_Would he ever be all right again?_

Harry's bottom lip trembled, and he hated the tears that dripped down his cheeks. He couldn't say it, but he knew that Dustin would likely be able to smell it.

“Three cubs lost in less than thirty-six hours...” Dustin whispered as he pulled Harry in for a hug, and he shuddered as he let the dominant hold him. It wasn't Fenrir, but it was someone he trusted, and for the moment at least, it was enough.

“Wait,” Harry croaked, wiping his eyes roughly as he looked back up at Dustin, and only then noticed how red the dominant's eyes were. “Shannon?”

“Lost his too,” Dustin said sadly, “was gonna be our first boy, that's what Marie told us. And those...those...” his voice wavered and died, while he offered Harry a watery smile. “Why do wizards always do this shit, eh? What did we ever do to them?”

“Three little baby boys,” Harry said, his voice cracking a little as he tried to keep his composure. Suddenly, keeping it together for Shannon's sake was more important to Harry than his own grief.

“Yeah,” Dustin said, his voice thick with anguish. “Come on, you need to get into bed before Marie skins me alive for leaving you standing this long...”

Dustin shepherded Harry over to the bed right next to Shannon's, who was either asleep or unconscious by the look of it. Harry saw no outer injuries, which was a good sign, but the knowledge that Shannon had lost his baby because of Harry made him feel positively sick with guilt.

Harry eased down into the bed, relieved to be off his feet, while Xavier muttered something about checking on things outside, and left, just as Marie moved over to Harry's bedside with a warm smile.

“Harry, welcome back,” Marie said, her voice soft and kind, it drawing him out of his anguished thoughts. He turned to gaze at her, and the full weight of what had occurred hit him again—his children were lost. Worse, it had been at the hands of people he had once thought of as his friends—his _family_. “How are you feeling?”

“Like I got run over by a lorry,” Harry replied with a small wince, “then stomped on several times for good measure.”

“Well, hopefully I can put some of that right,” she offered, still with the same smile. “Would it be all right if I examined you?”

Harry nodded, relieved that she didn't ask him what happened. Harry wasn't sure he could go over it more than once.

Marie withdrew her wand, and used to like a scanner, the tip blinking between red, yellow, and green lights, like a traffic light as she waved it just above Harry in small, tight circles.

Marie abruptly stopped her examination, and reached for Harry's hands, which had been badly scuffed in the fall.

“You got these later,” she said, and Harry winced.

“Caomh was...er...a bit too enthusiastic about greeting his mate,” Harry replied feebly, but the explanation merely made Marie's frown deepen, before she went about healing his wrists and ankles, rubbed raw by the ropes, and the scuffs on his palms.

“Your internal damage has been sutured by someone who knows their way around healing, and someone who is fairly familiar with our anatomy,” Marie said with an appreciative nod. “My scan tells me that you were invasively tended to twice, the second time, it seems, to remedy the mistakes of the first...healer.”

“Not a healer,” Harry muttered, “ _murderer._ ”

Marie's pleasant healer expression wavered, but did not fall. Instead, she reached forward to squeeze Harry's knee, while fat tears began to roll down his cheeks again. He didn't even bother to try and staunch the flow as he stared up at the ceiling of the cabin, his breath escaping him in shaky gasps. He wanted to _scream_ at the injustice of it all. Why had they taken his babies away? It wasn't _fair_.

“Harry,” she said softly. “I know you went through something _awful._ Words cannot begin to express how truly terrible your ordeal must have been. I will not lie and tell you that I _understand—_ I don't. I can't possibly know what that must have been like, but I will always be here to listen when you feel ready to talk about it. And when Shannon wakes, he, too, will likely need similar support. You two can help each other...and you have Alpha and the rest of the pack behind you. We all love you, and we all mourn your loss as though it was our own. We are _all_ here for you.”

Harry sniffed, and he rubbed at his eyes roughly. He didn't understand why this had happened to him. He didn't understand it at _all._

Marie helped him to change into some pyjamas, gave him a potion for the pain, and she had Aidan fetch him a good, hearty meal from the kitchens. Despite their care and warmth, Harry still felt distinctly empty and lost. Would Fenrir even _want_ him after what his so-called _friends_ had done to him? Now that he had been _violated?_ What sort of person would want him if he was so incapable of keeping their unborn cubs safe?

Harry knew that the healers wanted him to eat, but Harry could do little more than stare at the food in front of him. He had no appetite; more than anything, he just wanted to go to sleep and never wake up.

He was in the healer's cabin for maybe two hours when he suddenly heard a loud commotion emanating from outside. People were shouting, crying out, and a few sounded as though they were screaming.

Harry did not need to ask what had happened; Harry could smell Fenrir, though the presence of his mate made him shiver, rather than feel any sort of joy.

Accompanying him was the strong smell of human blood.

 

~*~

 

Fenrir knew he'd be swarmed the moment he made it back to the territory, but Sheehan thankfully took to the task of keeping the curious wolves back and answering their questions while he followed Harry's scent through the territory and towards the healer's cabin. His leg ached from where that stupid bint, Jones, tried to hobble him, but managed only to break his leg. It had been stupid to change back to human form after an injury like that, which had _definitely_ made it worse, but despite the pain, he would not show it in his walk, which was stiff and painful, but he carried precious cargo, and could not risk falling over and dropping it.

It was a small mercy that Harry's friends still loved him, even if the so-called _adults_ who had been charged with his safety had failed so abysmally.

 

_The children stood in a circle, staring down at the three bodies of Dedalus Diggle, Hestia Jones, and Kingsley Shacklebolt. None of them looked particularly upset by their deaths, nor the mangled, bloody state of the remains, though the gingers looked a little grey-faced, perhaps from knowing that one of the monsters who had hurt his mate still walked free—their mother._

_The frizzy haired girl from before rushed out of the dingy house quite suddenly, her eyes teary, while Poppy and Minerva were cleaning the blood off of the grass and pavement, erasing Fenrir's presence from the house. In the girl's arms was a floral-patterned bedsheet, and though it looked clean, Fenrir could smell blood and birthing fluids on it._

_With a sick feeling pooling in his stomach, he realised that the girl was holding his dead cubs._

“ _I—I didn't know if you wanted them, to give them a proper burial,” she said meekly, holding the bundle carefully in her arms, as though it was precious. “Those who did this terrible act, they wanted t-to burn the bodies. I heard them say things about giving Harry a clean slate by doing that, and when they weren't looking I stole them, and wrapped them up. I j-just c-couldn't let Harry's babies go through that. I_ couldn't _.”_

_Tears were now streaming down her cheeks, and one of the gingers stepped up to her, and wrapped an arm around her, while she held out the bundle to Fenrir._

 

What still startled Fenrir was how _light_ the bundle was. How could two cubs feel so weightless in his arms?

As he strode towards the cabin, his pack still pelting him with questions, he skidded to a halt, hesitating on the threshold. He needed to be seen to; despite all outward appearances his leg was extremely painful, and he needed to be there for his mate. However, he didn't know if he could stomach seeing Harry's heart break when he saw what Fenrir was carrying.

“It's okay, Dad,” Sheehan said, stopping beside him, and he rested a hand on his bloodstained arm. “Just go and do what needs to be done; me and Anaïs will keep the pack from barging in.”

Fenrir inclined his head, not missing the way Sheehan's voice quivered, and he remembered belatedly that it was not _just_ two infant cubs in his arms, but Sheehan's half-siblings. How could he be so foolish as to forget that?

“Give me a shout if you run into trouble,” Fenrir muttered, his voice just as weak as his son's, and his boy nodded once.

“I will, Dad.”

Fenrir took a breath to steady himself, and pushed open the door of the cabin.

Fenrir did not immediately see Harry upon entering, but he could smell his mate, and he sighed in relief. Marie, in contrast, had frozen, her gaze had fixed upon their blood-spattered alpha as well as the bundle in his arms, and her eyes filmed over with tears.

Quickly, she motioned to the second bed, which had been hidden by movable partitions.

Fenrir followed her instructions, and slipped into the space that was occupied by his mate, who was sitting up and smiling at him nervously, as though afraid of being rejected.

“Your friend...” Fenrir began, not quite certain what to say, “she saved our boys.”

“Hermione,” Harry said, wiping his eyes, “she helped Pomfrey put me right, after...”

He trailed off, unable to finish.

Fenrir stepped closer, supporting the bundle with one arm while he used to other to employ his werewolf magics, and forced the bed to widen, just enough so that he could lie next to his mate comfortably. Even so, it creaked ominously when he sat down.

Harry's eyes fell to the bundle in Fenrir's arms, and his breath caught.

“Is that...?” he began, unable to finish, and Fenrir nodded gravely.

“Would you like to hold them, pet?” Fenrir asked, uncertain whether or not it was a good idea—he didn't want to hurt Harry more than he already had, but his mate nodded, extending his arms, and Fenrir carefully gave the bundle to Harry.

The moment Harry had their children in his arms, a tiny, tearful sigh escaped him as his hold tightened around them.

“T-They're so light,” Harry said, petting the fabric of the bedsheet lightly. “They feel like nothing.”

Harry grabbed the edge of the bedsheet, and began to pull it back.

“Harry, maybe you shouldn't—” Fenrir began, unsure if Harry would be able to handle seeing their dead babies.

More than that, Fenrir wasn't sure if _he'd_ be able to handle seeing their cubs like that.

It was too late however, and Harry pulled back the sheet, displaying two tiny grey wolf cubs.

Their eyes were shut, ears flat against their little heads, tails tucked against their bottoms, and both were about the size of a chicken's egg. Had Fenrir not known what had happened, they almost looked to be sleeping.

Harry let out a little whimper, for the moment too consumed with grief to question Fenrir on their forms, and pulled the bundle up to his chest as tears began to trickle down his cheeks.

Fenrir did not hesitate to draw Harry close, and still supporting their tiny cubs, Harry pressed himself to Fenrir's chest, and wept.

“They took our cubs, Fenrir,” Harry choked out, “t-they _took them_ , Fenrir...”

Harry spoke his name as though he was crying for help, and Fenrir could do nothing but hug him closer.

“I know, pet, but they won't ever be able to do it again, I promise you that...” Fenrir murmured, trailing off when he noticed that Harry did not appear to be listening. His eyes were on the cubs again, tears dripping from his cheeks as he stroked the tiny, lifeless bodies, almost as though he hoped that his touch might somehow revive them.

“D-Did you kill them?” Harry asked, “did you hurt them, like they hurt our babies?”

“Yes, pet,” Fenrir murmured as he leant in to kiss the top of Harry's head, and his mate leant into the touch without hesitation. “The two men and that woman, Hestia, are dead. I transformed and ripped their throats out. That other woman, Molly, we could not find, and her children begged me not to hurt her. I touched none of your friends, or those who helped you.”

“So much for big, scary, Fenrir Greyback,” Harry said between soft hiccoughs. “You're going to ruin your reputation if you keep saving people.”

“I was never the monster that the wizards painted me as,” Fenrir replied, his tone edging with hurt, and Harry smiled up at him apologetically.

“I know, Fen, believe me,” Harry said as they both eased back into the bed, with Harry's eyes falling back down to their unmoving infants, and he hiccoughed with a small sob, as though he just remembered what was in his arms.

“I thought...” Harry sniffed, and rubbed his eyes, his other arm securely holding the tiny bodies. “I thought they'd look like us...have our fur. Or be human when they're born, or...I don't know what I'm saying.”

“All wolves are born in their wolf skin, pet,” Fenrir said, rubbing his back as he spoke softly and consolingly. “It is a defence mechanism; we develop faster as wolves, and can walk, run, or hide more quickly if a threat appears, whereas our human form is by and large without defences for the first few years of our lives. Most born werewolves stay in wolf form for their first six to eight months of life—Caomh was almost a year old before he took human form. Most subs are in wolf form longer, at least my kids were.”

“I sometimes forget that they're your kids, even though most of them look _just_ like you,” Harry said with a weak, apologetic smile, and Fenrir smiled as he moved in to kiss his mate gently. “And what about the fur? Where'd that silver come from?”

“It was my old coat.”

“Old coat?”

“Yes.” Fenrir nodded. “During the fallout of the first war, I needed to go into hiding, so one of the turned wolves in the pack thought it would be a good idea to disguise me, and used wizard magic to change my fur from silver to black. After I was caught and arrested I was stuck with the new fur, and by the time I escaped Azkaban he had died of old age, and no one was able to change me back.”

“Hermione probably could,” Harry said thoughtfully, “I mean, if you want your old coat back. She's the cleverest witch I've ever met, and she could probably do it.”

Fenrir grunted, uncertain if he wanted to be on the receiving end of someone's wand, even someone who his mate trusted. He recognized that Harry seemed to want to talk about anything but the bundle that he still clutched in his arms, and though he seemed to be veering towards denial over what had happened, he still appeared incapable of letting them go, and Fenrir found that he hadn't the faintest idea what to do or how to address it.

Fenrir petted Harry's hair, and grasped at straws as he tried to think of something— _anything—_ to say that might somehow salvage the life they'd begun to construct together, but nothing came to him as he continued to embrace his mate, unwilling to let him go.

 

~*~

 

Neville sat with Luna, Ron, Hermione, the rest of the Weasley children, as well as Professor McGonagall and Madam Pomfrey around the table in the dining room. It was quiet, and despite the fact that the blood had been cleaned up and the bodies disposed of, Neville swore that the house still smelt of death.

“What do we do now?” Bill finally asked, his voice hoarse, and his complexion almost grey. “Harry is back with...but...he...I don't know.”

“Greyback seems to be caring well for him, despite the confusing set of circumstances,” Pomfrey said calmly, almost consolingly, as though she was trying to reassure Bill as she spoke. “Harry was healthier than I've ever seen him, if emotionally shattered by what _we_ did to him. I saw no symptoms of Stockholm Syndrome when I treated him. He wanted to get back to Greyback, yes, but he wasn't blinded by it—he did not appear as though he could not function without him. He was hurt, physically and emotionally, by us, not his mate. We failed him, but it seems as though Greyback never did.”

“Added to that, I gather he was found _away_ from Greyback's company?” McGonagall asked, turning her attention to Neville, Ron, and Hermione, and the trio nodded.

“Yeah, Kingsley said so,” Neville said, and he struggled to keep his composure as Luna smiled at him, as though she approved of his confidence in front of the group. “He was with two other werewolves, but Greyback wasn't there.”

“Why, though?” Hermione asked, cradling her chin in her hand as she stared across the table at the two older women. “Why would Greyback let Harry go anywhere without him if he was pregnant? Every book I've ever read on werewolves states that they're wildly protective of their mates, especially when they're pregnant, so why would Greyback allow Harry to go anywhere without him?”

“Miss Granger, I thought the answer would be obvious,” Pomfrey said, smiling a little, but she said no more, and merely tapped her temple, as though she was trying to give Hermione a hint, which apparently seemed to suffice, as she slapped her hands down on the tabletop so hard that the few cups of tea upon the wooden surface rattled ominously.

“Oh, _of course!_ But, wait, no...no...oh, _yes! That's it!_ ”

“What's it?” Ron asked as he goggled at her, “what are you so excited about?”

“Oh, Ron, isn't it _obvious_?” Hermione asked, gazing around at the others, but Neville, like almost everyone else, merely gazed at her blankly. “Think about it: Greyback kidnaps Harry, holds him hostage, mates with him, _then_ realises that he cares about him, but in the process, he's inadvertently given this person he cares about Stockholm Syndrome, so he sends off Harry with two werewolves to cure him and give him his independence back. _That_ is why they were at that inn! Don't you remember what the Aurors who were shadowing them said? They were there for weeks, almost two whole months! Why _else_ would Harry stay away from his mate so long?”

“Hermione, I know you're brilliant and everything, but that sounds positively _barmy_ ,” Ron said with an incredulous laugh, and she scowled at him.

“Well if it's so ridiculous, what do _you_ think happened?” she sniped, and Ron opened his mouth to respond angrily, but McGonagall interjected before he could say a word.

“Now is _not_ the time for that, Miss Granger, Mr Weasley,” she said coldly, and both of them immediately went silent. “What we must decide now is how to act. Three of our number are dead; this will not be kept quiet. We cannot allow the wizarding world at large to know that Shacklebolt, Jones, and Diggle were killed at the hands of such an infamous werewolf. Beyond putting Mr Potter in _more_ danger, we risk the lives of dozens of men, women, and children, if the size of Greyback's pack is as large as it is rumoured to be. We also know that Molly is also at risk—Greyback may not stop to see reason when confronted with the knowledge that this woman aided in the killing of his unborn children and the kidnapping of his mate.”

“What should we do, then?” Hermione asked softly. “I hate what Molly did to Harry, I hate it so much, but I don't know—I mean, I don't think that that warrants a death sentence.”

“Werewolf law is brutal, from what I know of it,” McGonagall continued, her tone solemn. “If someone betrays them, or hurts them, the usual response to such a thing is death, and not an easy death, either.”

“Then what are we supposed to _do_?” Charlie demanded, his voice breaking a little. “I know my mum did wrong—beyond just wrong—but, blimey, she's still my mum. Greyback and that other wolf tore Kingsley and the others to _pieces_ before they finally died, like he knew just what bones to break and what parts to rip off without killing them outright—it was the most horrible thing I've ever seen. I've already lost my brother, Professor, I can't let my mum go through that, no matter what she's done.”

“She's still our mother,” Ginny echoed in a small voice, as though she was afraid of what the others might think of her for saying so, and did not lift her gaze from her lap as she spoke.

“I have a bit of an unconventional proposal, Professor,” Percy said suddenly, and all eyes turned to him. The third-eldest Weasley child did not look even remotely intimidated by the attention, and instead seemed almost to be in his element, despite the fact that his voice was reedy and worn-out, after all the horrors they'd witnessed since Molly and the others' betrayal.

McGonagall nodded her head, inviting him to continue.

Percy took a breath, and nodded his head once. To Neville, it appeared as though he was trying to work himself up to some sort of dramatic, or possibly dangerous announcement. Neville could feel the tension in the air, and he held his breath as Percy began to speak again.

“Let's arrest my mother.”

 


	16. Lost

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: And we're back! Thank you guys so much for your patience over the holidays, and I hope this chapter will live up to the wait :P next update is scheduled for January 20th. Enjoy!
> 
>  
> 
> **Content Warning: This chapter contains elements of werewolf violence.**

Chapter Sixteen – Lost

 

Harry hadn't talked much since the burial.

Fenrir had kept a close eye on him, minding his own jealousy at how Harry took comfort from Shannon almost as often as as he sought it from Fenrir himself. Both subs clearly needed it after their losses at the hands of those monstrous wizards, and Fenrir wasn't so pigheaded that he'd try to take any source of comfort away from his mate at a time like this.

Fenrir did not allow his jealousy to show, or his pain over what had happened. He did not shed a single tear as they laid the cubs to rest next to Lukas and the others of his family whom he'd lost in years past. For many nights after, Fenrir found Harry sitting by the fresh graves, his face wet with tears.

Fenrir would hold Harry whenever he found him like this, and swallowed his own grief. Harry needed it much more than he did.

As the days began to get shorter, and the nights longer and colder, Fenrir began to worry. Not only was Harry stuck in his depressive state, Fenrir had no idea how to make it better. He knew he could always go to Marie if he _really_ needed help, but part of him balked at the idea. What sort of alpha was he if he couldn't even help his own mate?

To top it all off, his shithead of a son was being more antagonistic that ever, snarling and hissing at anyone who would listen that Harry wasn't a fit Alpha Bitch, because he'd lost the cubs. It had gotten so bad that Fenrir had stumbled upon Xavier and Caomh arguing about it more than once, and he hadn't hesitated to beat Caomh down for his blatant disrespect every single time he caught him saying a word against his mate. _No one_ was allowed to talk about Harry that way, regardless who they were, but unfortunately, the damage had been done. The venomous words made Harry hide inside himself even more, and Fenrir was beginning to that if this kept up, he'd never be able to reach Harry again.

Fenrir was lost.

 

On the morning of the second full moon with Harry back with the pack, Fenrir woke with no small amount of trepidation. Harry was still asleep (which seemed to be his favourite activity these days), curled up close to Fenrir, with his nose buried in the crook of the alpha's neck. It was as though he was trying to find comfort in a place where the dominant's scent was strongest, but apparently hadn't known how to ask for it outright.

Fenrir tried not to move as he gazed down at Harry. He seemed to only know peace when he slept, and even then that peace was often interrupted by nightmares. Fenrir hated what those wizards had done, and hated even more that it had been at the hands of people who were supposedly Harry's _family_. He couldn't even fathom doing something like that to any of his pack, regardless how their pregnancy came about, and he could not understand how these humans could possibly justify violating Harry in such a horrible way.

If the intent of the wizards had been to ruin Harry's trust in people, they'd succeeded in leaps and bounds.

 _And then there's the last one, Molly_ , Fenrir thought, gritting his teeth a little. The wizard papers had said she'd been arrested for _undisclosed reasons_ , and there would be a press ban until after the trial, which had been slotted for more than a year away. Though Fenrir hoped it was due to what she'd done to his mate, it was equally probable that she'd done something else just as heinous, and wound up behind bars. Initially, that had mattered little to him—he still planned to kill her for what she'd done.

Only Harry's uncharacteristically soft, “just let her rot in there, Fen,” had stayed his hand, and he reluctantly let her be—for now. Perhaps she would get the death penalty, though admittedly the thought was still not as satisfying as ripping her head from her shoulders with his bare hands.

He hated them—he hated them _all_.

More than that, he hated himself for being so incapable of stopping it.

Fenrir swallowed his grief once again, just as he felt the first tendrils of it attempt to take hold of him as he recalled what those monsters had done to Harry and his cubs—he needed to be strong for Harry, and the pack. Now more than ever, they needed to see him as a strong and capable leader, and not someone who was incapable of meeting their needs.

There would be time for tears.

Later.

 

~*~

 

When Harry woke that morning, he found himself being cradled by Fenrir, with his nose pressed hard against the crook of the alpha's neck—again.

He didn't really understand why, but sleeping with Fenrir like that was comforting, and after everything, he could use a little comfort. And, with another heat beginning to loom distantly on the horizon, Fenrir's scent was doubly comforting, giving Harry safety and security while he tried to figure out how to talk to his mate about it.

In particular, the confusing shame of how much he wanted thisheat to work out as well as the last one, and have Fenrir's seed take.

He wanted cubs.

More than that, he wanted these cubs to _live_.

But at the same time, he felt a horrible sense of guilt for even _wanting_ it. He'd buried his cubs barely a month ago; he was still grieving, and already he was thinking of the next mating season?

Harry wanted it, and that _terrified_ him—he knew Fenrir was able to protect him if something happened, but _what if something happened?_

Harry hadn't even the nerve to broach the subject with Fenrir—not yet, anyway.

Though Fenrir never spoke on it—hell, he hadn't even _cried_ when they laid tiny little Ephraim and Rolf to rest (names Harry and Fenrir had chosen together, mere moments before the funeral). And since then, Harry hadn't been able to let his babies go, the babies he'd carried.

 _I need to try again, to know I can do it,_ Harry had often thought when he went to visit their graves, reaching out to touch the stones that had been laid at the head of the tiny burial mounds, the thought passing through his mind again and again, as though on a loop. This time, there would be no wizard interference. The wizards who'd done this to him were dead or jailed, and there would be nothing in this world they'd be able to do to stop him.

Harry let out a little whimper, and Fenrir jumped, as though he hadn't realised that Harry was awake. The small motion dragged Harry out of his morose thoughts, and in an instant, Harry was in Fenrir's arms.

“Shh, it's all right, pet,” Fenrir murmured, kissing his hair as he rubbed his back. “The wizards are dead and gone, they cannot hurt you here...”

“Fen, I'm so sorry,” Harry whimpered, “I couldn't p-protect them, I'm sorry, I'm _sorry_...”

“Shh, Harry, I know, it's not your fault, do you hear me? None of it was your fault...”

Harry didn't believe him—how could he? If he could have gotten to his wand, or accessed his magic wandlessly, he'd still have their cubs. He forced himself to nod, not wishing to argue, while he clung more tightly to his mate, who had been so caring and attentive ever since he'd gotten back, and so unlike himself that Harry sometimes had a hard time believing that it was _really_ Fenrir Greyback.

 _He has so many facets to him, and every time I think I have him figured out, he shows me another part of himself..._ Harry thought, inching up his body to press his lips to Fenrir's.

“Breeding Season is in two months,” Harry said, not quite meaning to voice what had been on is mind so often of late. However, there was nothing he could do about that now—he'd said it. Harry shivered a little when Fenrir's rough hand fell to his cheek, and stroked it gently.

“I know, pet,” Fenrir replied between soft, tender kisses, the contact devoid of its usual fire, which chilled Harry to the bone. He didn't like it when Fenrir was this gentle, as though he though he might break him. “No one is forcing you to try again so soon.”

“But I _want_ to,” Harry said emphatically, and he felt Fenrir freeze.

“What?”

“Fen, I want to—I _need_ to try again,” Harry said pleadingly. “There's this...this... _hole_ in me, and every time I think of it, all I can see is our babies. I need to try again, for me—for us. I'll do it right this time, I promise.”

“Harry, I don't think that you're a bad person or bad _parent_ for what happened to our unborn cubs,” Fenrir said, his voice firm. “But you lost our cubs so recently, we both need time to mourn what we've lost—”

“But, Fenrir, I _need_ this,” Harry protested, his voice beginning to crack. “Why don't you trust me? I won't even leave the cabin during the pregnancy if I have to—”

“—damn it, Harry, that's not what this is about!” Fenrir snapped, his sudden shift in tone making Harry jump in alarm. “Look, when I say _we_ need time...what I mean is...is... _I_ need time, all right? I'm not ready for more cubs, not so soon after...what happened.”

 _He doesn't trust me_ , Harry realised, his eyes widening, _he thinks I can't be trusted with following through with a pregnancy._

Harry fell silent as he felt his heart begin to break.

 

A heavy quiet had fallen between Harry and Fenrir as they got up to face the day. Given that it was the day of the full moon, everyone was full of energy and bore violent appetites, save for Harry and one other sub, who was gently being coaxed into eating by his mate.

Harry watched Shannon, Dustin, and their daughters, and he felt such respect for the sub as he somehow managed to smile and act normal with his children, though the moment they ran off to play, he was like a marionette whose strings had been cut, and his whole body seemed to sag, while Dustin embraced him, and spoke to him gently.

Harry understood this on a deep level. The burden of _being okay_ for their friends and family was hard. It was harder than Harry even knew, harder than it had been following Sirius's death. It felt _impossible_ sometimes to _be_ _okay,_ and not want to die from how bad it felt to have lost something so precious.

“Harry, you need to eat,” Fenrir said suddenly, drawing Harry from his thoughts. “The moon is tonight, and you'll need to keep up your strength.”

“What for?” Harry asked miserably, “obviously you think I can't _handle_ being a dad, so maybe I should just leave and save you the trouble of putting up with me.”

“Please do,” Caomh called out, “my dad deserves a _real_ mate, not a child bride.”

Harry felt his face burn with shame, and his stomach clenched, making him feel sick. Even as Fenrir got up in a flash to berate his son for his remark, watching Fenrir cuff his child and force him to leave the breakfast circle brought Harry no joy, and merely made his misery worse.

When Fenrir got back to him, he wrapped his arms around Harry and murmured sweet reassurances into Harry's ear. Harry heard none of it, given that he was too lost in his own misery, and the knowledge that he was burdening Fenrir just by _being here_.

 

The remainder of the day was more of the same. Caomh seemed more incensed and antagonistic than usual, and shot Harry with nasty barbs whenever his father was out of earshot, apparently not keen to get hit again.

“ _You should just leave,”_ he snarled, “ _my dad is burdened by you, and your inability to keep his cubs in your belly.”_

“ _You are a child, and my dad deserves a real mate.”_

“ _You're a coward—I heard you ran from that battle with your wizards. Just run again, I promise we won't miss you.”_

The words were worse than what he'd put up with in school. He didn't understand why Caomh hated him so much, and the worst of it was he was pretty sure he was right. What would Fenrir want with someone like him? Why would Fenrir _bother_ keeping him around when he'd failed him and their lost cubs?

 _I'll leave tonight,_ Harry thought as he leant back against a tree and stared up at the grey sky. _When the dominants are off hunting, I'll just go. I shouldn't burden Fenrir like this anymore._

The decision made Harry ache, and he felt a lump form in his throat as he gazed around the territory—cubs playing, the adults working, and everyone was smiling and having fun. This was a place of such peace and joy, virtually untouched by the horrors of war. He didn't want to leave, but at the same time, Harry felt almost as though he had to.

Harry tucked his head into his arms, and tried to hide his tears.

 

Despite the certainty with which Harry had made his decision, he found himself wavering as Fenrir dogged his steps, and tried to reassure him that he was in no way wrong or bad for what had happened to him, but Harry no longer believed it—now, he understood: Fenrir would be better off without him.

That night, as the sun bowed to the moon, Fenrir coaxed Harry through the change. He rubbed his back and murmured words of reassurance to him, fighting his own transformation in order to aid Harry through his—which was much more painful than usual. Both of them had known that it would be, of course—Marie had warned Harry that his body would use the moon's power to regenerate his lost organs that Kingsley had taken from him. She had warned that it might take a few moons for his organs to regenerate completely, and it would not be a pleasant experience. Additionally, he had learnt from his first moon back with the pack a month earlier that she had not been exaggerating.

When his transformation had finished, he felt too weak to move, and merely whined as Fenrir allowed his own change to take him before he hurried forward and licked Harry's muzzle gently, his enormous black form seeming to thrum with concern as he nuzzled Harry and checked him over.

Harry lay there, whimpering and unmoving, while his mate stood over him. As he did so, Harry spotted something odd under Fenrir's left foreleg—a narrow tuft of silver fur. For some reason, this felt significant, but Harry could not quite pinpoint why. In his simpler wolf state, he could not formulate thoughts in the same way he would if he were still human, and knew only that he was exhausted, and needed his mate to tend to him while he regained his strength.

For the better part of an hour, Fenrir lay with him and bared his teeth at anyone who got too close. His reprimands made the dominants who dared approach yelp and cry out, leaping away in an almost comical fashion, as though they had not expected their alpha to react in such a way. In this, Harry found himself unsurprised—the wolves were used to rushing out into the forest for their nightly hunt, and the wait was making everyone agitated and hungrier.

Even Harry's belly began to protest, and he whined, nudging Fenrir in encouragement to leave him and get a move on with the hunt. The alpha hesitated, but Harry's hunger pushed him forward, and he stood up, shaking his fur out, and he nuzzled Fenrir, as though to reassure his mate that he was all right.

Fenrir regarded Harry for a moment longer, then with a short huff he turned away and rounded up the other dominants, then the group disappeared into the woods for the hunt.

Harry shook himself again, and walked off to one of the trees that bracketed their territory. He lay down while he watched the dominants leave, while he tried to act calm, and not worry any of the other subs, whom he could feel watching him with concern.

Thankfully, the rambunctious cubs quickly drew the attention away from Harry. After a few cursory glances shot his way, the others soon realised that he wanted to be left alone, and no one approached him.

Harry realised that this was his best opportunity to break away from the pack. In this form, it came to him as an odd sort of need—almost a longing. Leave the pack, but do not be seen.

Harry circled the tree, almost as though he intended to pee on it, and used this opportunity to slink deeper into the woods, and towards the steep incline that led deeper into the forest. It was a route that the dominants rarely used for their hunts, given that it was difficult to drag a deer uphill with just their teeth.

Harry picked his way down the hill, his movements careful and cautious until the land evened out a little, and he broke into a run.

With his wolf eyes, it was easy to run through the woods unseen and unheard. He was like a shadow, moving silently, but with purpose, away from his home and his family—and Fenrir.

A howl broke through the heavy silence of the night, and Harry jolted to a stop.

It was Fenrir.

Harry's ears flattened as he whined, indecision once more flooding his senses as he glanced back the way he had come. His mate's call was a cry of victory for taking down an animal, and calling the other dominants back to him—the hunt had been successful, but Fenrir had clearly not yet discovered that he was missing. There was still time to go back and greet his mate, as though nothing had happened.

Harry took one single step back, and out of the darkness darted a wolf. A russet wolf that smelled like pack, and Harry recognized him as Caomh.

However, like he had been so often of late in his human form, Caomh was antagonistic, and bared his teeth, snarling and snapping as he bore down on Harry, running at him in a clear attack.

Harry let out a high yelp of fright before he ran off, far too weakened by his difficult transformation to hope to fight back. He just barely missed Caomh's teeth multiple times, as he moved, his panic beginning to mount; he didn't know where he was running, or why, and knew only that he needed to get away from Caomh before he hurt him.

He did not know how long he ran, but stumbled to an abrupt stop when he felt a strange tickling sensation float over his fur, and he whipped around, expecting to see an attack, instead he saw nothing—no one.

The forest was silent again.

Worse, harry could no longer smell or hear the territory, like he had been cut off from it. Harry let out a fearful whine, then howled as loudly and as long as he could, hoping that Fenrir would hear his distress, and come looking.

Harry nosed the ground, darting horizontally to the way he'd been running before, but found no familiar scents, almost as though he'd been transported to an entirely different forest. It was terrifying to his needy sub wolf mind, and made worse when at last he _did_ pick up the scent of wolves, but quickly realised that they were _not_ the wolves of his pack.

Harry turned, expecting to see another pack, or, worse, a rogue pack, when something sharp suddenly sank into his left flank. He yelped, his head whipping around to look, and he saw something tiny sticking out of his fur. A dart.

The sub followed his instincts and ran, even as the poison, drug, or whatever it was, began its work. His gait slowed gradually, even as he tried to keep running. Until at last he collapsed in the leaves, breathing shallowly as he tried to stay awake.

The last thing Harry saw was the silhouette of a man standing over him, but before he could react to it, his world was swallowed in black.

 

~*~

 

Remus lay in his cell, fresh from its weekly cleaning, and his belly full—for once. His skin twitched and ached as it always did on full moons these days. The urge to transform was still there, but the magics were confused, given that he was already locked in his wolf skin. It made his muscles cramp, and moving at all was painful.

It was still fairly early; Remus could hear the evening cleaners and guards going through the warehouse and cleaning the cages of their prisoners, which was by and large empty now, except for the wolf cages. He'd heard the men talking often, and he knew that they planned to move their operation as soon as the ones in the field got back with their catches, though Remus could not fathom why they needed to move the operation, that is, unless the Ministry was finally catching up to them.

As though on cue, one of the side-doors burst open, and an indignant poacher burst in—one whom Remus did not recognize.

“Oi!” he called, his voice echoing through the enormous space. “Ain't none of you lazy louts hearing me? Open the damn doors!”

By _doors,_ Remus knew that he meant the loading dock that they used to take in new arrivals to this hell. He tensed, but did not move, knowing that from where he was, there would be little he could do for the wolves—he was as powerless against these monsters.

 

Men shouted and ran around, opening the doors to the loading docks, and Remus watched helplessly as the men carried out four drugged and unconscious wolves. Three were large, hulking creatures, varying in colour from tawny brown to silvery grey, while the third was much smaller and black.

Remus sat up a little despite himself, watching as the men stuffed the large wolves in the three cages at the end of the line, and the little one in the cage right next to Remus's.

The little wolf smelt different—a sub. Remus knew that much, despite his limited exposure to his own kind. He was slender, but not underweight, and oddly, mixed in with the distinctive _sub_ smell that emanated off of him, there was something oddly familiar about his scent. It was as though Remus had smelt it before in some faraway place.

Remus shuffled as close to the bars of his cage as he dared, and sniffed again. The sub smelled sweet, like treacle, and the sharp scent of freshly cut lumber, or apple blossoms and burning wood. The gunpowder scent left behind by certain dark curses clung to his fur, paired with the sweetness of chocolate.

 _Why_ was it so familiar?

The wolf whimpered, the sound confused and distressed. He opened his vibrant green eyes, and Remus froze as everything clicked together in his mind.

_Harry._

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: (end) I just want to note that I really wanted to include a scene from Neville's POV in this chapter, and I hope how I approached Molly's arrest wasn't too flippant and quick. However, for how I have it all outlined, it made more sense to me to have it set up this way, so a more full version of what happens to Molly is coming, I just haven't been able to cover it yet! ^^;


	17. Fear and Lies

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Hey guys, thank you so much for the lovely comments on the last chapter! It was awesome to see you all so enthusiastic about the direction this story is taking :) I hope you guys continue to enjoy this week's update, and the next one will be posted on February 3rd. Enjoy!
> 
> **Trigger Warning: Sexual Harassment**

Chapter Seventeen – Fear and Lies

 

Harry's nose twitched, the scents flooding it burning his nose. All he could smell were the sharp scents of metal, stone, and excrement—along with what smelt like half a dozen unfamiliar wolves. He could not smell the lush greenery of the forest, or anything that smelt like home.

He let out a low whine, but unlike so many times in the past, Fenrir did not immediately rush to him to see that he was all right. That in itself was odd—where was his mate?

_I can't remember_ , Harry thought, blinking his eyes a little, but the light made his head thrum with pain. _Why can't I remember? What's going on?_

Harry whimpered again as he tried to open his eyes more fully, and this time the pain was slightly less, though his stomach jolted unpleasantly with alarm at the odd sort of tint the colours around him seemed to bestow, as though he had suddenly lost some of the colour spectrum of his eyes—he was seeing things like his wolf counterpart.

That was not the worst of it, however. When his vision began to clear, he realised, to his horror, that he was locked inside a wire cage.

Harry leapt to his feet. He needed to call out for his mate. As he stood up, his legs wobbled dangerously; the connection between his wolf and his human minds was muddled, making it hard to focus or control his limbs. Panic truly began to flood him then, as he realised that not only was he in a cage, but he seemed to be stuck in his wolf form as well.

His panic was making him dizzy, but despite that, Harry knew what he needed to do. He tilted his head back and began to howl, calling out desperately for Fenrir, but his call was abruptly cut short when a cricket bat slammed into the top of his cage, making him yelp with fright.

“Shut it, you,” the human above him snarled, “or we'll skin you _first_.”

Harry whimpered as his ears flattened against his head fearfully. He wasn't quite sure what the man meant by _skin_ , but he had a feeling that he wasn't joking. Reluctantly, he lay back down on the floor of the cage.

“Good boy,” the man praised, though Harry did not feel exactly warmed by his words. “Keep quiet, you mutt. Won't be long now.”

Harry whined again, but didn't dare howl as he watched the man walk away, and at the same moment he heard a shuffling next to him.

Harry turned, and jumped a little when he saw a dominant wolf in the cage next to him. He looked slender and sickly, with silver and tawny fur. There was a kindness in his amber eyes though, like he was trying to console Harry from his own cage.

Harry whimpered with confusion as he gazed at the other wolf. Something was familiar about him, though Harry was also quite certain he'd never seen him before. _Why_ was he so familiar?

The other wolf let out a soft yip as he shuffled towards the side of his cage that was closest to Harry, and pressed himself against it, once again as though he was trying to offer Harry comfort.

Harry hesitated, wary to accept comfort or reassurance from any dominant who was not his mate, and he cursed himself for still knowing so little of how werewolf society functioned.

Harry looked away from the wolf, and curled up miserably, trying not to think on it.

 

~*~

 

Remus watched Harry, his ears flat against his head as his heart thrummed with both panic and worry.

 

_Why was Harry a werewolf?_

_How did this happen?_

_Who had done this to him?_

 

Remus felt almost sick with guilt, in particular, guilt for being so incapable of stopping it. He was supposed to have protected Harry, not allow him to be cursed with this affliction.

Remus whimpered again, pressing up against the bars of his cage, but Harry remained curled up in a tight ball while he eyed him uncertainly, and shifted back a little. His ears were flat against his head, a look of uncertainty in his vibrant eyes.

It was as though Harry did not recognize him.

Remus whimpered again, nosing the bars of the cage, and Harry lurched back a little, the uncertainty and confusion apparent in his expression, even in this form, and Remus cursed those horrible men for locking them in a form where they could not speak.

A sharp, metallic crash sounded from Harry's other side. Remus glanced up, and to his disgust, he saw one of the larger dominants, a large brown wolf, leering at Harry. His teeth were bared, and his pink erection was free of its furry sac, displaying exactly what he wanted to do to the sub, given half the chance.

Harry jolted back from the other wolf, slamming hard enough into the wall of the cage that the bars shuddered, but unfortunately did not break. One of the poachers yelled, and raced over to the end of the warehouse where the werewolves were situated, and slammed the cricket bat into the large wolf's cage several times, shouting obscenities as he did so.

“Oi, stop it, _stop it_ , you filthy beast!” he yelled while he continued to slam the bat into the bars, but far from be intimidated by the human, the wolf merely gazed up at the man like he was an annoying fly that he _longed_ to swat.

The wolf's lip curled back in a snarl as he reluctantly lay back down, though his eyes did not leave the human.

“You'll be first, wolfie,” the man said threateningly while he waved the bat in warning, “I'll have so much fun peeling your skin off.”

Remus watched Harry flatten himself in his cage, his eyes wide, and his lithe form began to visibly tremble with fright.

_Oh, Harry, I'm so sorry..._ Remus thought as he let out a soft whine in an effort to comfort him, and immediately the poacher slammed the bat into his cage, making him jump. He glanced up at the poacher, his expression blank and unafraid. If he was to get Harry through this, Harry would need to trust that Remus was unafraid of these men—that he could protect him.

Regardless if it appeared as though Harry no longer recognized him.

 

~*~

 

_I've been kidnapped by poachers. Oh, this is so much worse than I thought._

The realization raced through Harry's head on a loop, repeating over and over as his white-hot panic froze him to the spot. And worse, Caomh had chased him off intentionally—did that mean he planned to make his father believe that Harry had left willingly?

Harry felt sick. He whimpered, and buried his muzzle in his front paws as he tried to hide from the situation, and pretended it wasn't happening.

_I want to go home. I want Fenrir. I don't want this. Why is it that every time I try to run away from my problems, I somehow make them ten times worse?_

A soft whining filled the silence as the poacher stomped off back to his companions at the other end of the expansive warehouse. Harry opened his eyes, and saw the sickly-looking wolf was pressed up to the bars again. His ears were back, and he had flattened himself to the ground in a display of submission. It was the polar opposite to what the other wolves around him were doing, edging up to the cages with their cocks out, making it _quite_ clear what they wanted from Harry. Comparatively, Harry couldn't figure out what this wolf's motives were.

What he did know was that for some unfathomable reason, he wanted to _help_.

Harry watched him curiously, his gaze fixed firmly upon the wolf next to him, while he tried to ignore the one on his opposite side. The crude, large dominant one was vaguely familiar by scent, though Harry could not place it. He didn't particularly want to, either. Given how the larger wolf was acting, Harry had a sneaking suspicion he knew _exactly_ who lay under the wolf skin.

At the very least, he knew that none of these wolves were from his pack. It was confusing for Harry, given that he was both relieved that no one else had been caught, and terrified at being left alone like this.

Harry wanted to howl again and try to call Fenrir to him, despite the futility of it. Only his fear of the poachers kept him from doing so.

With a soft, despondent sigh, Harry buried his nose in his forepaws, and tried not to think about it.

 

~*~

 

Fenrir's head was pounding. It felt as though he'd had a whole barrel of Xiang's home brew all to himself; something he had learnt many years ago was always a bad idea. Even if it didn't make you go blind, it was enough to even knock _him_ off his feet.

_What happened?_ He wondered as he let out a little groan. Hot wolf bodies were pressed into him on every side, but even without opening his eyes, he could tell that none of them were Harry. By scent alone, he knew that it was his hunting party.

Fenrir cracked his eyes open, and felt his confusion mount when he realised that they were on the side of a country road. They were still deep in the wilderness, given that no houses were visible on either side of the tarmac, but to be so close to humans was unnerving—even in their wolf forms they usually had more sense than this.

More alarming still was the fact that he could not remember what had happened the previous night. The last time he'd failed to remember a moon was when he was little more than a cub. To have it happen at his age was worrying. Usually, it took deeply traumatic events—or magic—to wipe one's mind like this.

“Alpha?” a small, reedy voice asked, which Fenrir immediately recognized as Anaïs.

His daughter sounded as bad as he felt, and when he turned to her, he spotted her sitting up, as naked as he was, in a pile of burly male dominants. There was what looked to be a burn on her shoulder, and her hair had splayed out across her neck and chest in a long, tangled mess.

“Are you all right, Ana?” he asked, allowing his voice to drop the usual businesslike tone he used with her, and she smiled a little as she nodded.

“Splitting headache, but I'm all right. We better wake these lazy louts up and Apparate back to the territory for some supplies before we pick up the trail again...”

“Trail?” Fenrir asked as he furrowed his brow in confusion, and Anaïs frowned.

“ _Harry's_ trail,” she said, worry flooding her expression when she realised that Fenrir genuinely had no idea what she was talking about. “Dad, don't you remember? We were finishing the hunt, and we heard Harry howl. You panicked and raced off to follow it. I came with you, along with the rest of the hunting party. You shooed a few of them back to collect the hunts for the subs who were waiting back in the territory, and the rest of us tracked Harry's scent. He was outside the wards, and when we caught up with them, there were these humans loading Harry and a few other wolves into a van. You snapped and attacked, and they retaliated by hitting us with curses. I blacked out, but I guess they hit you with a memory charm too.”

“If we'd've eaten, we would've been able to shake off those curses like static,” Fenrir said with a growl as he punched the ground in frustration. He'd failed Harry— _again_.

“I think they were poachers,” Anaïs said. “I have no clue why they didn't take any of us, but...”

“Probably couldn't fit more in their cages,” Fenrir muttered, anger and fury flooding his mind. Harry was in the hands of _poachers_ , and here he was, just chatting away with his daughter. What sort of mate _was_ he? “Get the others up, and get them back to the territory. As soon as we're packed and dressed, we're leaving, and we're not coming back until Harry is with us.”

Fenrir shifted to his wolf form, while most of the others ran through the woods, or Apparated if they knew how. Despite the haste with which they all moved, still Fenrir found it to be too slow. Harry was lost to him, and he hadn't found him yet. That was _unacceptable_.

When Fenrir hit the incline that led up to the territory, he heard shouting. It was not a joyous sound—the voices were harsh and angry, and in the midst of it all, Fenrir was certain he could hear someone crying.

What was going _on_?

Fenrir picked up his pace, running as fast as his legs would carry him up the incline, and broke through the line of trees that circled their space to find that a group of subs had surrounded his son, and they were all screaming at him while his child wept openly, though he hadn't the faintest idea _why_ the subs had targeted his son. Caomh was curled up in a ball, his hands over his head, while a few of the subs kicked at him, yelling obscenities, while the sub wept loudly as he tried to defend himself from the attack.

The sight of seeing his son being assaulted was almost equal to his fear for Harry. Despite his secondary sex, Caomh had never be one to cry, and to see him doing so now was nothing short of terrifying.

“ _You did this, you did it!_ ” one of the subs shrieked as the pushed Caomh to the ground when he tried to get back up. “ _You're the reason our Alpha Bitch is gone!_

“I didn't, I don't do anything! Stop, please!” Caomh cried, eyes filled with tears, and an arm lifted once more to try and protect himself from the onslaught.

Fenrir snapped out of his shock, and ran forward as he yelled, “ _o_ _i,_ _get away from him!_ ”

Immediately all of the subs scattered with a few yelps of fright, leaving his son curled up on the ground and weeping. Fenrir hurried over to him, and placed a hand on Caomh's shoulder as he said, “up you get, son,” and rubbed his back gently, while he avoided the blossoming bruises on every part of the young man's body.

Fenrir waited, unmoving, while Caomh hiccoughed and tried valiantly to compose himself, but after a moment, it seemed as though he was too overwhelmed by what had happened to him.

“Come on, Caomh,” Fenrir said, “we'll get you some clothes, and we have to have a quick talk about this before I get going.”

A distinctly sour look crossed his son's expression at the vague reference to Harry, but in light of Caomh's attack, it did not seem to be the best time to reprimand him for it. Instead, Fenrir eased him to his feet, and guided him to the cabin that he shared with Xavier, unwilling to leave the young man's side after what had just transpired.

Fenrir waited outside the cabin, uncaring that he was naked, and when Caomh ventured back out, fully dressed, the alpha silently waved his hand, bidding Caomh to follow. He bowed his head and followed his father up to the alpha's cabin.

Fenrir watched him as they walked, his mind lapsing back to what the other subs had accused him of. Fenrir didn't want his son to have somehow aided in Harry's disappearance, but at the same time, the attack on him was worrying. What did they know? Had they seen Caomh do something to Harry when he was out hunting?

Fenrir's insides squirmed with unease.

They made it up to Fenrir's cabin in uncomfortable silence. Fenrir slipped inside ahead of Caomh, and went about yanking on a pair of jeans and a loose shirt. Generally he didn't like wearing upper garments; he gave off too much body heat for that, and it always left him feeling stifled. However, there was a chance they'd be heading into human territories, and it would look distinctly odd if a human saw him wandering around half-naked in October.

When Fenrir had finished dressing, he turned to his son, who was sitting by his empty fire pit, and he was being unnervingly quiet. Whether he was complaining or just talking, Caomh had never been one for silence, and the fact that he was doing it now was deeply unsettling.

“Son,” Fenrir addressed him calmly, stepping forward until he was able to sit at his side, and Caomh looked up at him nervously. “Want to tell me why those subs were attacking you?”

“B-Because they thought I h-had something to do with Harry's disappearance,” Caomh replied, his voice badly shaking as he spoke. “B-But I _didn't_. I swear, Dad, I didn't do anything wrong!”

“You can't deny that of all the pack, you are the one who has always been the most openly hostile towards Harry,” Fenrir said, using the Calm Voice that Lukas used to use on Caomh, which had always been more effective than Fenrir's own penchant for yelling. He found it surprising how difficult it was to maintain. With a heavy sigh, his previous reluctance falling away, he asked, “why do you hate him so much?”

“B-Because you've replaced Dad,” Caomh said, his voice cracking as tears came to his eyes. Once again, Fenrir was reminded of how devastated Caomh had been when Lukas had been killed. He had been ten years old, and deeply attached to his birth father.

Clearly, despite the many years that had passed since that horrible day, Caomh had never gotten over it, which was quickly validated as he continued, “y-you replaced Dad with _him._ You're forgetting about Dad so that you can have a nice young thing in your bed again. I find it disgusting.”

“Caomh, son, I will always love you father,” Fenrir said, his voice soft, but firm. “But people move on. Just because I have taken a new mate does not mean I am replacing your father. I will always love him, and I will always remember him. He was a good father to you and your siblings, and he loved this life more than anyone I have ever met. I took Harry as a mate because I felt an attraction, which is why most people take a mate, mind you. He is an adult, and just because he is younger than you hardly makes him a child. He had been through more shit than anyone in this pack, I'll warrant. He is strong, he is unwaveringly kind, and despite what a little bitch you've been to him, I have never seen him snap back at you. Regardless what you feel about him, he clearly does not feel the same about you.

“Now, Caomh, I will ask you this once,” Fenrir continued, his voice shifting from gentle understanding to a firm, more _alpha_ tone of voice. “Did you see Harry last night when he was taken? Did those subs have any reason to do what they did?”

“Last night, after you left, H-Harry just laid by himself, not interacting with anyone,” Caomh said, hiccoughing again as he spoke. “Then, I saw him get up and disappear into the woods, but in the opposite direction of the hunting party. I had a bad feeling, so I followed him.”

“You followed him,” Fenrir echoed, and his son nodded. “All right, then what happened?”

“I saw Harry r-running through the woods. It looked like he was going as fast as he possibly could—like he was running away. I followed, but I kept quiet so that he wouldn't hear me. Then when you howled, signalling that you and the rest of the hunting party had successfully caught something, Harry just froze, like he wasn't sure if he should keep running. I came out, and when he saw me, he panicked, and bolted again, like a frightened deer. I chased him, as non-threatening as possible, and I circled him, trying to herd him back towards the main area of the territory.

“But then Harry got outside the wards, and I went to follow, as it was clear that Harry didn't realise he could just walk back in, and he was attacked by those poachers. I panicked, and ran back to the territory.”

Caomh hung his head, tears dripping from the tip of his nose, and Fenrir placed a hand on his back, patting gently.

“It's all right, son,” Fenrir said, “you did your best to get him back, and that is more than I could have asked of you. Thank you.”

“I'm sorry, Dad,” Caomh whispered softly, “I didn't mean to lose him like that...”

“It's all right,” Fenrir repeated, and after a moment's hesitation, he drew his son into a warm, if slightly awkward embrace.

Fenrir had never been one for warm, fuzzy affection towards his kids. He loved them, sure, and had always been a decent father to them growing up, but once they'd hit their teens, his affection for them had shifted more to words, rather than hugs.

This fact was not lost on Caomh, who let out a little squeak of surprise at Fenrir's hug, but after a half-beat of frozen shock, he relaxed, and hugged his father back.

“We can talk more when I get back with Harry, if you want,” Fenrir said as he pulled back. “But right now I really need to go. I've lingered too long as it is.”

Caomh nodded, his eyes red and puffy from crying as he watched his father stand up and grab a bag, which he stuffed with one set of Harry's clothes, and the few healing potions and salves he happened to have around the cabin—just in case.

“Think you'll find him, Dad?” Caomh asked uncertainly, and Fenrir smirked.

“Oh, I know I will,” Fenrir said confidently.

No power on this earth was stupid enough to keep Fenrir Greyback from his goal.

He would find Harry alive, no matter what it took.

 


	18. Time Is On My Side

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Next update is February 17th. Enjoy!
> 
> **Content Warning: Violence, Gore**

Chapter Eighteen – Time is on my Side

 

After spending so many days locked in this horrible place, Harry had no idea how the other creatures could cope with it.

He'd already lost count of them—had it been a week? Two weeks? A few days?

Time lost all meaning in this hell.

The stress had made Harry almost constantly sick; he was rapidly losing weight, aided in part by the sub-par 'food' he was given, and he threw up everything he ate.

Harry's only saving grace was the sickly wolf.

The creature somehow managed to stomach the foul concoction, much to Harry's amazement, but he never seemed to gain any weight. He was always too skinny, always looked weak, but never once did he show any weakness, and acted as though the terrible situation did not bother him.

He would press close to the cage bars nearest to Harry, but unlike the other dominants in here with him, it did not feel like a sexually motivated action. Instead, the sickly wolf seemed to be doing everything he could to reassure Harry.

At times, he would let out a rumbling growl that was a clear wolfish attempt to keep Harry calm, and other times it was a soft whine, as though he was trying to ask if Harry was all right.

Harry would rest against the bars in response, wishing he could get closer to the sickly wolf. He felt like pack, smelt like it, but there was nothing sexual in either of their actions.

Though Harry could not explain it, even to himself, the wolf smelt like family—almost like a father, or something very close to it.

It was reassuring, especially now that the poachers had begun to cull the other creatures in the warehouse with them.

They'd begun recently. Harry always felt a chill course through him as he watched he poachers carry the caged creatures outside, and he'd hear them scream in unbridled agony.

Not long after, the poachers would carry skins, horns, and other valuable parts back inside and stack them up against a wall, already dried and ready to sell, chatting amongst themselves amicably, as though they _hadn't_ just committed murder.

They had killed a group of different creatures every day, and now, only the werewolves were left.

Harry tried to keep from thinking about it.

He curled up in a tight ball, praying that Fenrir would find him, and soon.

 

~*~

 

Fenrir growled, pacing back and forth as he glared at his hunting party. They should have left _days_ ago, but the idiotic dominants were _still_ bickering about how to proceed with finding Harry.

The ongoing arguments were not without just cause, however. How were they to track a muggle vehicle across asphalt with no clear idea which way it had gone?

Fenrir had no answer to this question, and he hated how weak it made him look to his pack. He was their leader, and he had absolutely no idea how to save the pack's alpha bitch from a fate worse than death.

Scenting seemed useless to them, when Harry's scent would be carried away with the van, and since they did not Apparate, they could not follow the magical trail, either.

In short, they were stuck.

 

Until one morning, when Anaïs wandered off not long after breakfast, only to come back a few hours later looking quite proud of herself.

“Ana?” Fenrir prompted when she stopped before him and the other dominants, who were once more trying—and failing—to come up with a plan. “Something on your mind?”

Instead of answering, she shoved a narrow corked bottle into Fenrir's hands, which seemed to be filled with black bits of something, though he had no idea what.

“What the hell is this?” Fenrir asked, lifting the bottle up and squinting at its odd contents. How would _this_ help locate Harry?

“Tyre scrapings from the scene,” she explained simply. “Take a whiff.”

Fenrir eyed her dubiously, but obeyed, uncorking the bottle and taking a short sniff.

The initial scent that hit Fenrir's nose was one of burnt rubber. Nothing special about that. There were hundreds—probably _millions_ of cars on the road, and thus it did not make it a scent that could be tracked easily.

Fenrir sniffed again when Anaïs had not moved, and continued to watch her father expectantly. Under the rubber smell, was that of wolves. And under that...

_Harry._

“Show me where you found this.”

 

Anaïs led Fenrir back to the place where his Harry had been taken from him. It looked the same, but he trusted his daughter, and shifted to his wolf form as he followed her, using his wolf's enhanced scent to sniff at the spot that she indicated, where there was little more than a black mark on the edge of the road, showing where the vehicle had sped off from.

Fenrir bowed forward, all but pressing his nose against the stone as he sniffed. The scent of Harry was faint, but it was definitely there. At last—a small, concrete clue that had eluded them for nearly a full week.

It was more than just a clue, however.

It was a way to Harry.

“Get the hunting party,” Fenrir said, his voice rough as he transformed back to his human shape. “Tell Sheehan that he's in charge, and get my bag of Harry's clothes—he'll need them when we find him. We're going, now.”

 

~*~

 

Remus's ears flattened against his head as he observed the night watchmen patrol the nearly-empty warehouse.

The air was tense, and Remus could feel the fear that radiated off every werewolf, despite how strongly most of them tried to hide it.

Tonight was their last night.

Tomorrow, their slaughter would begin.

 

Harry seemed to know this as well. He wasn't eating, and his muzzle was buried in his front paws, as though he was trying to hide from this nightmare.

_Oh, Harry, I wish I could save you from this fate..._ Remus thought as he let out a soft whine, and he heard one of the guards let out a loud laugh, as though their fear was some sort of joke to them.

Remus went quiet, and curled up in his cage. He stared out at the men, his head across his paws, and his thoughts strayed to Dora and little Teddy.

_Dora, I miss you..._ Remus thought, and let out a tiny whine. His wife and son would live without him if he did not find a way out of this, and chances were good that he would die in here.

In fact, it was rather a miracle that he hadn't already.

Mirroring Harry, Remus nosed at his paws as he curled up, trying to make himself as small as possible. During his time as an undercover agent for Dumbledore, he'd heard many other dominants proclaim that this was _no way_ for a dominant to act. Showing fear was a weakness, according to them.

But what else could Remus do? He was trapped in a magically reinforced cage, with a silver door upon it, and saw no way out. There was nothing he _could_ do. He couldn't help Harry, he couldn't see his wife and child one last time, not before those _monsters_ slaughtered him like an animal.

The least he could do was try and reassure himself, regardless how _weak_ it made him look.

 

Remus was almost asleep when a sudden, deafening explosion tore through the quiet of the warehouse.

He saw Harry leap up with a terrified yelp, while Remus and the other dominants glanced up, but otherwise did not react, their expressions wary.

Remus heard yelling, cursing, closely followed by screams of pain, and as the smoke cleared, he saw a group of people cutting a bloody swath through the guards with no effort at all.

By and large, Remus did not recognize the members of the group. However, the man leading them was one he knew, unfortunately, too well.

 

_Greyback_.

 

~*~

 

The warehouse that Fenrir presently found himself in was disgusting. It reeked of faeces, vomit, and blood. Death was heavy in the air; he could smell it even before he spotted the stacks of horns, skins, and other magical creature body parts sitting along the wall.

It infuriated Fenrir even more than _his Harry_ was being housed in such a hovel.

They would pay for this. They would _all_ pay.

They took his Harry, they terrorized him, and regardless if Harry was safe or not, he vowed to leave _none_ alive.

 

The humans were shocked by their appearance, which had at least had given them the element of surprise. _Even so-called hunters_ like these could not match a werewolf in stealth, and the exterior guards had gone down with little effort. They had not even turned around when Fenrir and the others had snuck up behind them and snapped their necks.

Inside, many more of the poachers were clustered together, eyes wide and shouting at each other, less like a well-trained unit, and more like a group of foolish pups who had no _clue_ how to fight.

Fenrir surged forward, his hunting party at his back, and the poacher he had been aiming for let out a terrified shriek as he froze when Fenrir coiled a hand around his throat, breaking it one-handed.

The death seemed to shift some of the poachers into something close to a fighting mindset, but many of them were scrambling to get _away_ from the werewolves, instead of trying to confront them.

Something ghostly whooshed past Fenrir as he targeted another poacher, like some sort of sudden spectre that seemed to appear out of nowhere.

It was only after Fenrir had taken down the next human that he realised, foolishly, that the ghostly thing must have been a talking Patronus. A dozen more men burst through the doors within moments, some brandishing weapons, others their wands, and they were all shouting obscenities as they converged on Fenrir and his hunting party.

Most of the pack had taken a much more bloody tack to subduing their attackers than Fenrir had. He spotted Anaïs physically rip the head off the human she had been fighting, and he saw another of his hunting party, Dominic, bury his fist in the human's chest, and ripped out the heart.

Such a feats were not easy to do barehanded—for a human, that is—but their werewolf strength made it almost comically easy. Fenrir smirked with pride at the sight; Anaïs in particular was not normally one for bloodshed, but where the alpha bitch was involved, she became downright vicious.

Fenrir just barely dodged a silver bullet from one of the weapons brandished by one of the humans, which landed in the leg of the man he'd been fighting. At the same moment, Fenrir realised that it was not a bullet, but a dart. Apparently, it contained a poison of some kind, which knocked out his opponent almost immediately.

_This certainly makes things easier,_ Fenrir thought with a nasty smirk.

Fenrir placed himself in between the men with the dart guns and some of the other, less observant poachers.

The men took the bait, and lifted their guns, clearly aiming to take Fenrir down.

Fenrir watched them carefully; their fingers curled around the triggers of their weapons, and the moment they squeezed off the round, he jumped out of the way of the three shooters easily, only to have them hit their companions instead.

He smirked with satisfaction at the startled cries the poachers made, and in particular the way they reached for the area where the dart had landed, yanking them out, but based on how sluggish their movements already were, it was clear that it was too late.

Brimming with pride at how well his plan had worked, Fenrir repeated it, dropping twice as many of the poachers as the others in his hunting party. Anaïs seemed to catch on to his plan and mimicked him a few times, but seemed to grow bored of this manoeuvre, and went back to killing the humans much more quickly than Fenrir would have expected of her.

 

Soon, there was only one human left.

His companions were either dead or knocked out, and he seemed to know that he was a doomed man.

He tried in vain to run, only to have Fenrir reach out and grab him by the throat, snapping the bone he found there like kindling.

The silence of the men did little to quiet the space however, given that the moment that the last poacher fell, a chorus of yips and howls flooded the space.

The source of the sound came from one wolf, a little black sub in the centre cage.

Fenrir sauntered forward, chuckling warmly as he watched Harry try to jump up, digging at the bars of the door of the cage as he whined and barked, but despite his werewolf strength, could not break through.

Once Fenrir got closer, he could see why. The bars were silver, and they were leaving terrible burn marks on Harry's paws.

Fenrir stopped in front of Harry's prison, just as a loud, threatening snarl sounded from Fenrir's right.

He turned and raised his eyebrows at the old wolf, who he recognized immediately—Remus Lupin.

Lupin smelt like pack, giving Fenrir the impression that Harry may have claimed him, albeit not in a romantic way, which was good. It meant he didn't need to rip the old wolf limb from limb, which would have been all too easy, given how visibly weak he appeared.

Lupin was so skinny that Fenrir could count his ribs, the emaciation in part poor health, and in part abusing his body with poisons like the wolfsbane potion. He arched a brow at the wolf, recognizing his stance and vocalizations as a warning to not go nearer to Harry, but Lupin was so puny that he was hardly any real _threat_ to Fenrir.

“What's your plan here, Lupin?” Fenrir asked him impatiently, a mocking note in his voice that made Harry whine with distress. “Are you gonna attack me for taking back what's mine? I could kill you before you would have a chance to blink.”

Harry whined again, making it clear he did not like Fenrir's words. Fenrir chuckled as he shook his head; both at his mate for being so soft, and at Lupin for thinking he could take him on and come out of it in one piece.

However, regardless of Lupin's attitude, he really wasn't Fenrir's concern.

Fenrir shifted his gaze back to Harry, and flexed his hands, making the knuckles crack. Lupin was growling again, but Fenrir ignored him as he braced himself for the pain that was still to come.

Gritting his teeth, Fenrir curled his fingers between the bars of the cage door, ignoring the burning pain, and grunted as he broke through a number of flimsy supposedly _unbreakable_ charms using his own brand of magic, and with another grunt, he ripped the door off its hinges.

 

~*~

 

An explosion of joy burst through Harry's chest as he leapt from the cage, and raced for Fenrir. Remus was growling still, and fleetingly Harry thought it was probably a good thing that Fenrir hadn't freed him yet. His relationship with Fenrir would take more than a little explaining for Remus to understand it, and even then Harry wasn't sure how well he'd digest the information.

Harry banished his worries as he jumped up on his mate happily, and was gifted with a rare smile. His heavy hand fell atop Harry's head, patting him gently, and Harry let out another little yip as he leant into the touch.

“Foolish sub,” Fenrir said fondly, “why not transform and kiss me properly?”

Harry whined, pulling back from Fenrir to sit down, and he blinked at Harry.

“What is it, pet? Why don't you transform back?”

“I'm not sure he can,” Anaïs offered from her place behind Fenrir, where she was apparently guarding the bodies of the poachers, and Harry barked in agreement. “Did you ever know Harry to have the ability to change at will before?”

“You're stuck?” Fenrir asked, and Harry nodded.

“Lupin, what about you? And save me your fucking defensive bullshit,” Fenrir continued, rolling his eyes a little when Remus answered with a warning growl.

“Ana?” Fenrir said, turning back to his beta, and she raised her eyebrows at her father in a silent question. “Think these are all of the bastards?” he asked, and motioned to the mound of poachers.

“I think so, why?”

Fenrir smirked.

“Curses like this usually die with the wizard.”

For half a moment, Harry wasn't certain what Fenrir meant. The dominant stepped back, and returned to the unmoving to the bodies. Anaïs looked particularly grim at her father's words, but before Harry could fathom why Fenrir was acting so oddly, he watched with horror as his mate moved through the mass of bodies, and began to stomp on the necks of the unconscious poachers.

Harry froze. Horror flooded through him as he watched his mate murder wizard after wizard in cold blood, acting as though he was doing nothing more than swatting a fly.

Harry ran forward, intent to stop the massacre when a sudden violent pain flooded through him, stopping him short.

It was a familiar pain, but this time it felt infinitely worse. Ripping, agonizing pain seemed to touch every part of him, as though all his muscles were tearing apart, he let out a short scream as he was abruptly forced back into his human skin.

Harry was only vaguely aware of the sound of more screams around him as the other wolves transformed back as well.

Harry slumped to the ground, something close to a wheeze slipping past his lips as he tried to get a handle on the ache of his body. The concrete floor seemed to burn cold, but it felt almost achingly good against his hot skin.

“Harry,” a voice murmured, soft and heavy with concern. Harry cracked an eye open, and his gaze was filled with the sight of his mate hovering over him, his eyes flooded with worry. “Are you all right?”

“Hurts...” Harry rasped, his voice little more than a high whisper, and shivered when Fenrir reached out to pet his sweat-soaked hair.

“I'm here,” Fenrir murmured, “I'm not letting you go—not again.”

Harry closed his eyes, his tears mingling with his perspiration as he felt a cold chill settle over his heart. He hated to see those men be killed like that; it was deeply confusing, and made him dizzy. They probably deserved it, the world was probably better off without them, but still Fenrir had killed them _all_.

 

“ _Get—away—from—Harry,_ ” a voice wheezed, breaking Harry and Fenrir out of their moment, and Harry glanced over to see Remus out of his cage, pale, and with a faintly green blanket wrapped around his shoulders, saving his dignity, if only somewhat. Harry assumed that one of the hunting party had freed him, given that Anaïs was now standing before the cages along with the others of the hunting party, some of the wolves were free, but a few others were still caged, and a conflicted look had settled on the beta's face, as though she didn't know what to do with them.

This was not for nothing however, given that Harry recognized one of the caged wolves as Theron, the rogue alpha who had tried to assault him months earlier.

“What do you plan on doing about it, Lupin?” Fenrir growled, his voice dragging Harry back to the confrontation between Remus and his mate. “You can barely stand, much less challenge my claim on him.”

“You—you _changed_ him, I know you did. It's clear to me now, but I _won't_ let you steal his innocence too,” Remus hissed, his fingers curling as though he longed to be gripping his wand, but despite his clear weakness, he wasn't backing off.

Harry knew that words alone would not convince Remus. He believed, too, that the only reason that Remus could not smell the intermingling of Harry and Fenrir's scents marking them as mated was due to his weakness from the sudden transformation back to his human form—or maybe the wolfsbane, Harry wasn't completely sure.

Regardless, Harry wasn't about to let Remus tear them apart, and especially not when Fenrir just found him again.

Ignoring his protesting muscles, Harry forced himself up with a soft gasp of pain, and he immediately crawled into Fenrir's arms, curling up in the warm space of his chest, and buried his nose in the crook of Fenrir's throat, scenting him intimately.

“I'm not going anywhere, Remus,” Harry said when he turned back to the older wolf, and narrowed his eyes at him in a look that all but dared him to try and separate them.

“Good boy,” Fenrir purred into his ear, making Harry smile as the dominant wound his thick arm around Harry's waist, tugging him closer.

Harry turned back to his mate, ignoring Remus for the moment, and kissed him.

It was amazing, really, what a simple display of affection could do. In that instance he felt Fenrir relax, his arms securing around Harry, holding him close, even while Remus sputtered with disbelief not ten feet from them.

None of that mattered, not really.

The rogues at his back, Remus, Fenrir's bloodthirsty tendencies, everything—it was all things he could deal with in time.

With Fenrir, Harry felt as though he could get through anything, and make it out the other side unscathed. There was nothing on this earth that could separate them, not again.

“Fen?” Harry asked, his voice soft, barely above a whisper, ensuring that only his mate could hear him.

“What is it, pet?”

“Can we go home?”

Fenrir smiled, the expression more warm and open than Harry had ever seen before, and he leant in to press a gentle kiss to Harry's lips.

“Anything you want, pet.”

 


	19. Reunion

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Next update is scheduled for March 3rd. Enjoy! :) Sorry for the delay in posting, connectivity issues, and due to lack of time I wasn't able to edit this over twice like I usually do, so if there are any major mistakes, please let me know :)

Chapter Nineteen - Reunion

 

The Leaky Cauldron looked odd to Neville, in particular after he'd spent so much time in Grimmauld Place.

Neville sat with Ron, Hermione, and Luna around a small round table at the back of the pub. A pitcher of butterbeer sat between them, but no one had touched it, and no one spoke.

Neville had no idea what to say. What _could_ be said in a time like this? Molly was in prison, they had no idea how Harry was doing, and everything was just a complete and utter _mess_.

Luna, thankfully, broke the silence before it could get any more awkward.

“Azkaban had its visiting day recently, didn't it?” Luna chirped, her tone devoid of any sort of accusation as she gazed across the table at Ron. “Did you visit with your mother, Ronald?”

“Yeah,” Ron hedged, his voice rough, as though it had taken true strength to voice his answer aloud. “Kingsley's gotten rid of all the Dementors so it was just human guards, but it was still horrible. Mum refuses to admit she's done anything wrong. Ginny doesn't want to visit again, and Dad is trying to talk her into going back next month.”

“Oh, that sounds hard,” Luna replied, nodding her head a little. “Ginny is very strong-willed.”

“Yeah,” Ron agreed, laughing a little, though the vocalization sounded strained.

“Ginny will know if visiting your mum is right for her,” Hermione added, her tone much more awkward than Luna's was, as though she wasn't completely certain if Ron wanted to talk about this at the moment. She shifted a little, and took his hand. “No one can make that decision for her.”

Ron nodded a little, and Neville noted how neither girl was asking Ron specifically how he felt about the whole ordeal. Neville thought that Ron might not be ready to talk about it, but the girls seemed to sense this too, talking around the topic as they were, and giving Ron openings to talk if he changed his mind.

Neville was grateful for their tact—he would have had no _clue_ how to help Ron, but Hermione and Luna seemed to know exactly what to say in a difficult situation like this.

Slowly, they tucked into their butterbeer, and tried to talk about normal things—quidditch, celebrity gossip, _anything_ —but the conversation was still strained and awkward. After everything, it seemed almost impossible to hold onto any sense of normalcy.

“I wonder how Harry's doing,” Hermione said after another pause in their conversation, and sighed. “Do you think he's...happy?”

“I dunno if _happy_ would be the right word for it,” Neville offered, and winced. “After what they did?”

“I know,” Hermione replied, her frown deepening. Luna bowed her head as though in prayer.

“He's probably happy to be back with his pa—” Ron began, breaking off when he glanced around the pub, then amended his words, “er, his family, at least. They'll be able to help him.”

“I sent him an owl recently, but he never replied,” Hermione said sadly. “I don't want to be too confrontational, I just miss him.”

“He probably needs some time,” Neville said. “I mean...the fact that his...er... _friend_ didn't rip our heads off probably means that he doesn't completely blame us for what's happened...”

“I _know_ that,” Hermione snapped, then winced as she offered Neville an apologetic look. “Sorry. I just...”

“Miss him,” Ron finished for her, and she nodded.

At the same moment, a tawny owl that Neville recognized as belonging to McGonagall swooped into the pub, circled for a moment, then dropped to their table, an envelope falling atop Hermione's tankard, making her gasp in surprise.

The owl did not wait, but took off, while Hermione hastily tore open the missive, and read its contents, her eyes going wider the lower down she read.

“Hermione?” Luna asked, her voice halting, and much less airy than it usually was. “Is everything okay?”

“It's...it's Remus,” she said, her voice shaking a little. “He's alive.”

 

~*~

 

“You are _not_ taking Harry anywhere!”

Fenrir ground his teeth. Harry was still in his arms, and he wasn't about to put his weakened mate down, not for anyone.

And _certainly_ not for a scrawny little thing like Remus Lupin.

“I'm not, am I?” Fenrir growled out, and Lupin narrowed his eyes at him. “What are _you_ planning on doing about it?”

“Fen, don't,” Harry protested weakly, “please, he's just worried.”

“I don't give a rat's fart how _worried_ he is; I'm still not letting him take you from me.”

“And I'm not going anywhere, love, but you have to let me talk to him,” Harry insisted, his voice soft and patient, like Fenrir was some sort of enraged wild animal. “He needs to understand that you didn't kidnap me in the dead of night or something.”

“Technically I did,” he pointed out, smirking a little, and Harry let out a small giggle.

“All right, yes, _but_ you've since made up for it. Can I talk to him? Please? He can't Apparate out of here without a wand, so there's no chance of me being kidnapped.”

“ _Again_ ,” Fenrir added pointedly, and Harry flushed a faint pink. “You get kidnapped more than anyone I've ever fucking met.”

“But I didn't _mean_ to!” Harry protested, and wiggled in his arms. “Seriously, Fen, put me down. I need to talk to Remus.”

Fenrir growled at the suggestion, and Harry rolled his eyes.

“My wonderful mate, my alpha, my _only_ dominant,” Harry said, though Fenrir did not particularly like the sickly sweet and mocking note in his sub's voice. “Remus is my _only family_. If you try to keep him from me, I will rip off your balls and feed them to Theron. Do you understand me?”

“I'm listening to every word,” Fenrir warned, caving much more quickly than he would have liked to Harry's demands, but then something told him that his threat was not completely idle, and it would be better to just let Harry talk to the silly, stubborn dominant. “On the condition that you put some clothes on first. I'll not have you display what is mine to someone as unworthy as him.”

Harry did not look pleased with his remark, but for the moment Fenrir chose to ignore the sourpuss expression on the sub's face as he pressed the bag he'd brought into Harry's hands. Harry smiled a little when he opened it, and found not just the clothing Fenrir had packed, but salted meats and a water skin as well.

Fenrir watched Harry dress hastily, and noted how thin he'd gotten in such a short span of time—he'd need to fatten him up again before winter came.

Once Harry was dressed, he moved in to peck a light kiss to Fenrir's lips, then turned to face Remus Lupin.

 

~*~

 

Harry turned to Remus, and bit his lip.

“Er...hi, Remus,” Harry hedged, and fought the urge to roll his eyes when he felt Fenrir shadow him as he stepped forward. He elbowed Fenrir's gut to try and give him the hint to back off, but his elbow collided with a firm wall of muscle, and the dominant refused to budge. “Erm...I'm sure this might come as a little bit of a shock...”

“A little?” Remus interrupted, sputtering angrily. “A _little?_ Harry, do you even know who that man is? What he has _done_?”

“Er...”

Harry trailed off, like he'd been posed a particularly difficult question during a lesson, and tilted his head up to grin at his mate, who offered him a slight smirk in return.

“My mate,” Harry replied, his voice a little breathy, and reached for him. Fenrir happily closed the distance between them, and tugged Harry flush against his chest. “We've been together for...nearly six months.”

“Harry, please,” Remus begged, drawing Harry's attention back to him. “You _can't_ want this. You _can't_ have chosen this. He's old enough to be _my_ father, much less _yours._ ”

Harry chewed his lip, momentarily at a loss for what to say. If he told the truth about how they'd gotten together, it would just give Remus more ammunition to try and break them up. At the same time however, he didn't want to lie to someone he regarded almost as a father. In particular, if the truth slipped out later, Harry knew that Remus would feel deeply betrayed that Harry had lied to him about such a serious thing.

“I've chosen this, Remus,” Harry said at last, his voice patient, even, and firm. “Please know that I do truly want to be with him. He's...he's been everything to me since the war ended. He saved me, even when I didn't know I needed saving. He gave me a family, Remus. A real one.”

“Harry, you don't know what you're saying,” Remus pleaded, his voice thick, almost as though he was on the verge of tears. “He kidnapped you and brainwashed you, you don't _really_ want this.”

“Yeah, actually, I do,” Harry countered, frowning at the older man. “You know what he did for me, Remus?” he asked, but when Remus did not respond, Harry rushed forward.

“I didn't get it at first; I was confused, and I didn't understand. Out of the blue, I went off with two pack members. No one would tell me why, and we stayed away for ages. I missed Fenrir, and I wanted to go home. I didn't understand what we were doing there. But after a while, I figured it out. Fenrir was _worried_ about me. I was acting...not myself, and being with him out of circumstance, and not 'cause I wanted him. Then, the two pack members, Shannon and Dustin, they took me away to this little inn, and we explored, and acted like tourists, and it was fun for a while, until I wanted to go home. Even after being away from my mate for _ages_ , I still wanted to be with him. From what I know, if it was brainwashing, I would not have wanted to go back. I _love_ him, Remus, do you get that?”

Harry swallowed thickly around the lump in his throat. He almost wanted to tell Remus about what had happened after with the Order, but the memories of it were too horrible. He _couldn't_ speak on it.

“But what about the others, Harry?” Remus asked, his voice softer, weaker, as though he believed Harry's sentiments, but at the same time, _couldn't_ believe it. “Ron, Hermione...the other Weasleys. I am certain Molly would love to see you.”

Fenrir growled, and Harry flinched involuntarily. Remus narrowed his eyes suspiciously, and it took Harry several minutes to find his voice again.

“N-No,” Harry rasped as he pressed back against Fenrir. The dominant linked an arm around Harry's waist, and Harry gripped tightly to it. “I won't see _her_ again. Not ever. She's a _monster_ , Remus.”

“Harry?” Remus asked, his voice softer, and losing its pleading lilt. “What happened?”

“Those bastards cut him open and slaughtered our cubs like they were rabid animals,” Fenrir growled. “Your precious _family_ did not care in the slightest for Harry's wishes. They stole from us something more precious than anything in this world. You will not force Harry back into the arms of his abusers—I won't allow it.”

Harry pressed closer to Fenrir, turning his head a little to scent his mate, and reassure that he was truly there. Fenrir ran a hand up and down Harry's back in quiet reassurance, and Harry shut his eyes, the motion causing tears to force their way from his eyes, and Fenrir reached up to brush them away without comment.

“It's all right, Harry,” Fenrir murmured, “it's all right. They're gone.”

Harry let out a soft sob as he tried to control himself, and he glanced back to Remus, his eyes still shiny, but unwilling to let go of Fenrir in order to possibly make Remus feel less uncomfortable. He _needed_ Fenrir.

“He's been nothing but good to me, Remus,” Harry said, “please, believe me. I don't need you hovering over me when there's someone else who needs you now much more than I do.”

“And who is that?”

“Teddy.”

Remus flinched, as though he'd been struck. A flash of guilt crossed his features for barely a moment, then it was gone.

“Dora is with him. It's _you_ I'm worried about right now, Harry.”

“But...” Harry paused, and bit his lip. “You know she...well...you _do_ know, don't you?”

“Know what?” Remus narrowed his eyes, and Harry glanced to Fenrir. Harry didn't know how much his mate knew about the casualties from the Battle of Hogwarts, but the dominant nodded his head encouragingly, and Harry looked back to Remus.

“Tonks, she...well...” Harry paused again, and bit his lip. “She died, during the Battle of Hogwarts. We thought that both of you died.”

A stricken look crossed Remus's face, and he took a sharp step back, his bare foot slapping sharply against the floor of the warehouse.

“No,” Remus replied. “I—you're wrong.”

“I'm sorry, Remus,” Harry said, his voice soft and pleading. “I'm so sorry to have to be the one to tell you this. But Teddy needs you now; I'm safe with Fenrir and the pack, but Teddy...he _needs_ his father.”

“Teddy...” Remus hugged the blanket more firmly around himself, and looked around, his expression lost, as though he did not know what to do.

“I'm okay, Moony,” Harry said, using his childhood nickname for the first time he could recall, and it had an amazing effect on the older man. He looked at Harry like he was gazing at an old friend. His eyes filmed over with tears, and he hastily looked away from Harry, as though he did not wish for the young man to see him cry.

“If I am to allow you to go with...with... _him_ , I have a few conditions,” Remus said, his tone almost distracted as he cleared his throat as he tried to compose himself. He paused long enough to step over to the pile of mangled corpses, and he fished a wand out of the pocket of one of the dead men. Sparks flew from the end, certifying that it accepted Remus as its new master, and he used the wand to transfigure the blanket that was still around his shoulders into a set of proper clothes, a loose jumper and set of trousers.

“What are your conditions?” Harry asked when Remus stepped back over to him, head held high, as though determined to look stronger than he likely felt in front of Fenrir.

“You are to check in with me. _Every. Day,_ ” Remus said firmly. “And you are to hold nothing back. If he starts doing _anything_ improper, I am coming out there, and I am dragging you back to Andromeda's house. No exceptions. I won't have him mistreating you, Harry. You are like a son to me, and I will not sit idly by if he hurts you.”

“Remus—” Harry began to protest, his voice close to a whine, but the older man was not swayed.

“No. Exceptions,” he repeated, and crossed his arms as he narrowed his eyes at Harry.

“ _Best just tell him what he wants to hear, pet,_ ” Fenrir murmured into Harry's ear, softly enough that it was unlikely that Remus would catch it. “ _And I promise to be wildly inappropriate with you, so that you have_ plenty _of writing material._ ”

Harry jumped a little when Fenrir stealthily pinched his arse, and he swatted his mate's arm, though it did little to dim the lecherous smirk upon the dominant's face.

“All right, Remus, fine,” Harry conceded with a small, annoyed huff. “I'll write you every day. And I won't let Fenrir do anything that I don't want him to.”

Harry paused, and bit his lip. He glanced back to Fenrir, whose mischievous expression had dimmed a little, and he nodded at Harry in encouragement, as though he knew what Harry was going to offer.

“Erm...you know, if you want, you can always come up and spend the moon with us,” Harry said, and Remus narrowed his eyes a little, as though he did not appreciate the offer as much as Harry had hoped.

“I will...think about it, Harry,” Remus said haltingly, though to Harry it sounded like a firm _no_. Remus stepped forward, and Harry mirrored him, Fenrir—surprisingly—letting go of him without complaint.

Remus did not hesitate, but drew Harry into a tight embrace. Harry clung to Remus, shivering a little when he heard Fenrir growl, and he kicked his leg back, the sole of his foot colliding with Fenrir's shin, though the action did little to shut him up.

“Are you sure about this, Harry?” Remus whispered to him. “You will always have a place in my home, if you want it. You are like a son to me. You don't need to be with... _him._ ”

“I'm sure, Remus,” Harry replied. “Teddy needs you more than I do.”

Remus eyed him, his brow furrowed as though he wanted to contradict him, but thought better of it at the last minute.

“I'm okay, Remus,” Harry repeated, “I'm safe, and I'm with people I trust. I'll write you every day so that you know I'm fine, and you are always welcome to come see me. Plus, I still need to properly meet little Teddy.”

Remus did not appear wholly convinced by this, and once again glanced in between Harry and Fenrir, his eyes slightly narrowed, as though he was looking for fault from Harry, or Fenrir, or both.

“All right, that's enough,” Fenrir growled, brushing past Harry to touch Remus's shoulder, much more gently than Harry would have expected. “Come walk with me, Lupin.”

Harry watched, his bottom lip caught between his teeth as Fenrir marched Remus out of earshot. He began to speak to Remus, his voice little more than a low thrum, though Harry could not discern the words.

Harry didn't quite know what to do. He turned back to Anaïs, who was still guarding the rogue wolves, though now only Theron was caged, the others having apparently been released, and the beta wolf was enthusiastically ignoring Theron as he tried to provoke her, though her eyes were fixed elsewhere.

On Remus.

Harry arched a brow, given that her expression was clearly not a curious or protective one, but something closer to interest.

Harry bit back a smile; he knew Remus would need time after Tonks and after his ordeal here before he got into another relationship, but it was nice to know there was an option there for him.

_And maybe Anaïs could help him heal in the long run_ , Harry thought, his mind flooding with fantasies of Remus living with him at the pack, and how good that would be, like his family was finally together again.

Harry glanced to Remus and Fenrir, and did not fail to notice how unhappy Remus appeared to be, as though whatever Fenrir was telling him was upsetting him further, not making him feel better.

_Maybe no new romances for a while yet_ , Harry thought with a wince as the two dominant wolves turned back, and headed for Harry again.

Upon reaching him, Fenrir tugged Harry flush against his chest, making him yelp in surprise, and scowled at Fenrir over his overt display of claim, but the dominant pointedly ignored him, as well as Remus, who was rolling his eyes at Fenrir's attitude.

“I will come on the next full moon to check on you, Harry,” Remus said in a very parental _no arguments_ sort of tone. It made Harry feel that, for once, the idea of having a parental figure wasn't quite as appealing. He winced, which Remus ignored as he continued to speak. “I still expect letters daily. I won't leave you alone, not again. Do you understand me?”

“Yes, Remus,” Harry mumbled sullenly, pressing closer to Fenrir as he spoke, and his mate tensed his arm around Harry's waist, holding him firmly, but gently.

Remus gave Harry one last long look, as though he wasn't certain whether he truly wanted to leave, then with a heavy, defeated sigh, he turned on the spot, and Disapparated.

Harry stared at the spot where Remus had been standing for a long, uninterrupted moment. Fenrir did not speak, but his large, callused hand brushed up and down his back gently in silent reassurance.

With a small sigh, Harry leant against his mate, seeking comfort. Fenrir gently swept him into his arms like he weighed nothing, and carried him out of the building.

 


	20. Truths

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Next update is scheduled for March 17th. Enjoy!

Chapter Twenty – Truths

 

The moment that Remus appeared outside of Andromeda Tonks's house, he already wanted to go back for Harry.

_This is so wrong,_ Remus thought as he fell to one knee. His weakness from his capture was once more reasserting itself, and it amazed him how one simple Apparition trip could exhaust him so thoroughly. _I should never have left Harry with..._ him _. I should go back for Harry, regardless if he protests or not. It would be for his own good to get him as far away from Greyback as possible._

“Just...as soon...as I catch my breath...” he gasped weakly, lifting an arm to swipe it across his forehead, and the sleeve of his shirt came away soaked with sweat.

At the same moment, the door of Andromeda's house burst open, and a voice barked, “ _Stop! Who goes there?”_

“It's me,” Remus croaked, staring at the dark doorway as he got up on unsteady feet, but Andromeda stayed inside. However, even from this distance Remus could see the tip of his mother-in-law-'s wand pointing directly at him.

“Who's _me?_ ” she demanded, her wand seeming to quiver a little, though Remus could not tell if this was out of anger or fear.

“It's me, Andromeda,” Remus repeated, panting harshly as he staggered towards the door, slowly, while he prayed that she would not openly hex him. “I am Remus John Lupin, married to Nymphadora Tonks, father to Teddy Remus Lupin. I am a werewolf, and the last living Marauder. Please, I need to come in.”

“Remus?” Andromeda asked, at last poking her head out of the house, appearing very much the same as the last time he had seen her, if perhaps a little more exhausted than usual. “But...you're dead.”

“I was...indisposed,” Remus explained awkwardly. “Please, may I come in? I would like to rest, and...I would like to see my son.”

“Oh, of course,” she said, jumping a little as she stepped aside to allow him entry. As he passed by her through the narrow hall, she suddenly gasped sharply.

“Oh, _Remus_ ,” she said, her voice aghast, “what on earth _happened_ to you? You're skin and bone!”

“Please,” Remus croaked, while he tried to offer her a reassuring smile, though he found himself too fatigued to do so. “I would like to sit down, and have something to eat, if you can spare it. I want to see my son. I need...God, I don't know what I need, but I need to see him.”

“Of course,” Andromeda replied, her eyes seeming to soften a little as she began to understand just what sort of state Remus was truly in. “Please, come with me.”

Andromeda guided Remus into the sitting room. In a truly motherly fashion, she set him down on the sofa, and bundled him up in a thick quilt before she provided him with a bowl of hearty beef stew, a thick slice of crusty bread, and a strong cup of tea.

In addition to all the creature comforts, Remus was provided with something else too.

A little boy, dressed in a sea-green jumper and little baby jeans.

“Baaa!” Teddy said, his amber eyes widening when he saw Remus, as though he recognized him immediately. He reached out his chubby little arms for Remus, and Remus in turn felt his heart swell at the sight of his son.

“Teddy, hello there,” Remus said, his voice cracking a little as he set aside the food and held out his arms, though he was too weak to get up. He accepted the little boy from Andromeda, while he did his best to not weep in front of her, though his eyes already feel considerably moist.

For the first time, he began to feel as though he had truly come home.

“Baaa,” Teddy said again, and reached up to clumsily pat Remus's cheek, before scrunching up his little face, and transforming his hair to match Remus's—grey and all.

“Goodness, look at how much you've grown, little one,” Remus said, smiling when Teddy let out a delighted giggle as he tapped the baby boy's nose gently. “You look just like your mother with that face, but your hair is mine...for the moment, at least.”

He teased a few of the grey strands, and Teddy let out another happy little giggle.

“It looks as though he remembers you,” Andromeda said fondly as she settled down in one of the armchairs with a cup of tea of her own, and Remus smiled sadly. In such a short course of time, he had already missed so much.

“I can't imagine how he can,” Remus said as he bounced the boy on his knee, making the infant let out more vocalizations of joy while he pawed at his father, while Remus tried to collect his thoughts, though it was difficult—he needed to rest, he knew that, but part of him still ached to go back for Harry. “I was only around for a month before...everything. Is it true? Is Dora really gone?”

“I'm afraid so,” Andromeda replied, bowing her head solemnly, and despite her attempted stoicism, Remus spotted a single tear trickle down her cheek. “And poor Ted. It's just been me and little Teddy here.”

“All this time, you've been raising him alone?”

“There was no one else. What with the Order off and away looking for Harry, and the horrible events that followed...I couldn't put Teddy through any sort of stress, not at such a young age. I thought it would be better to stay away, at least until everything settled down.”

“Wait, what are you talking about?” Remus asked, just as Teddy began to fuss, and Andromeda passed Remus a stuffed lamb, which he offered the boy, and Teddy hugged it close with a little sigh. “You mean the Order _knew_ that Greyback had Harry all this time?”

“I only know everything second-hand, and I will not discuss it in front of Teddy,” Andromeda warned, her tone firm. “And neither should you. Children hear everything, Remus, and despite the fact that I would _like_ to know what on earth happened to you, it can all wait until his nap time.”

“You're right, I'm sorry,” Remus conceded at once, nodding his head in agreement. It was true, children _did_ hear everything, and he was not going to risk hurting Teddy by speaking on such dark topics right in front of him.

Instead, Remus settled his son against his chest, and smiled down at him as the tot shook his head, changing his hair again, this time to an aquamarine that matched his jumper.

“Daaa,” Teddy said with a little sigh of contentment as he leant back against his father, while Remus picked his bowl of stew back up.

This moment of peace and of reconnection with his son would not last; Remus knew that he needed to savour it.

Everything else could wait.

~*~

 

The the hunting party followed Fenrir out of the warehouse, with Harry in his arms—despite his protests that he could _walk—_ and Anaïs bringing up the rear.

Harry looked around, seeing where he was for the first time since his capture. He found that they were standing outside an old, abandoned factory not far from the motorway, and in the distance, Harry could see the faintest glimpse of the London skyline.

“You lot, get moving,” Fenrir ordered the group as he gently set Harry on his feet. “Ana, carry Harry.”

“I'm not—” Harry began to protest, but Fenrir was quick to cut him off.

“You were held captive for a full week, and I can practically see your ribs,” Fenrir snapped, narrowing his eyes at him. “No arguments; you're not going to hurt yourself for your pride. Once you're all far enough away, I'll disperse your scent before I let Theron out so that he can't follow us, and then I'll catch up. I will _not_ let that fuckwit find out where we live.”

“We'll go downwind, just in case, but do you think it's safe to let him free?” Anaïs asked uncertainly, and Fenrir offered his daughter a curt nod.

“Theron won't be stupid enough to go after the same wolves who saved his skin, but I won't take any chances. Even the most heartless rogues would never double-cross a Life Debt like that, but Theron has never been one to hold such things in very high regard. Now, go. Get moving.”

“But—” Harry tried again, unfortunately his protest was cut off as he yelped again, this time in surprise of Anaïs scooping him up and hefting him onto her back. Before Harry could utter a single syllable, she was off, with the rest of the hunting party following in her wake.

“ _Fenrir!_ ” Harry called, but already his mate had disappeared back into the warehouse, and with Anaïs sprinting away at a jogging pace, his prison was quickly fading into the distance.

“Don't worry, Harry,” Anaïs said warmly as she ran, her voice not carrying even the slightest hint of fatigue, as though she was doing nothing more strenuous than walking leisurely. “Dad won't let that poor excuse for a wolf get to us. You're safe now, I promise.”

“It's not _me_ I'm worried about,” Harry muttered sourly, and glared at the back of the beta's neck. He felt so _silly_ being carried like this; he was _more_ than capable of keeping pace on his own two feet. Beyond that, he hated how he was already parted from Fenrir, after being reunited for barely half an hour. Why did this _always_ happen to him?

“Your mate will be fine,” Anaïs replied without missing a beat, and Harry flushed at the distinctive smile in her tone. “My dad won't be disappearing this time. He'll be back soon—just you wait and see.”

“I guess,” Harry conceded, pressing his cheek to her shoulder blade while the hunting party continued to run. “What are we going to do when we get back?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean...about...Caomh,” Harry explained.

“What about Caomh?”

_Uh oh,_ Harry thought, realizing too late that Anaïs had no idea what Caomh had done. _This isn't going to end well._

“Er...nothing.”

“ _Stop!_ ” Anaïs shouted, and immediately, every single dominant screeched to a halt. “Take a breather, you lot. I need to talk to the Alpha Bitch.”

Without another word, Anaïs stepped away from the others, well out of earshot before she set Harry down. He wobbled a little, but Anaïs was there in an instant, steadying him while she stared down at the sub with hard eyes, so like her father's, and yet so _unlike_ him at the same time.

“Now, Harry,” she said gently, “please tell me what you're going on about. Why did you bring up Caomh? My dad told me that he tried to _stop_ you leaving, nothing else.”

“It's nothing,” Harry replied quickly, making the older woman frown at him. “Really.”

“Harry,” she said, her voice heavy with warning. “We care about you, not only Caomh. He's my brother, yes, but _you_ are our Alpha Bitch. We care for you both the same. Please, what's going on?”

“I...I don't want to cause the pack any more trouble,” Harry explained quickly, unwilling to look at her, and she let out a tiny, sad sigh in response.

“And trouble has been festering for a while, hasn't it?” she asked, making Harry's frown deepen. “Harry, we can't fix the pack's problems without talking about them. If you say nothing, things will only fester and get worse. Dad, me, and all the rest of the pack want peace, not fighting. So if you tell us what happened, we can work on fixing the problems—they won't be ignored. I know it might _feel_ like you're causing trouble by telling us what Caomh may or may not have done, but you're not betraying anyone. By talking about it, you're helping us fix things—I promise you that.”

Harry glanced back up to her, and saw that the beta wolf was smiling. Her scent and demeanour exuded a sense of calm and kindness, and in that moment, she deeply reminded Harry of Remus, which immediately put him at ease. Unlike her father, who was gruff and could be heavy-handed with things at times, with Anaïs, Harry felt that he could trust her to handle the situation delicately.

“That...that night,” Harry began, his voice halting and hesitant, “I thought that I was a burden on the pack, so I decided to leave.

“When the hunting party had left, and no one was watching me, I ran off. I ran and ran, but then I heard Fenrir howl, and I stopped. I wanted to go back, and pretend that I hadn't tried to leave. But then...Caomh found me.”

“What did he do, Harry?”

“H-He chased me, and tried to attack me. He wouldn't stop, and I'm pants at fighting in my wolf form, I just panicked and ran, but then...I—I _hit_ something, and all the pack scents and everything just disappeared. Caomh wasn't there anymore, and then the poachers came. You know the rest.”

Harry bowed his head shamefully, and wrapped his arms around himself, shivering a little. He still didn't understand why Caomh had _done_ that.

“What you hit was the warding magics around the territory,” a voice filled in, making Harry's gaze snap up. Fenrir was approaching them, a few streaks of blood on his chest, and a half-healed bite mark on his shoulder, clearly from the bite of another wolf. Harry rushed to Fenrir without a thought, his eyes on the wound, and the dominant chuckled warmly as he reached down to pet Harry's hair gently.

“Theron was not quite as grateful for our help as he should have been,” he explained, “he is no longer a threat to anything living.”

“What are we going to do about Caomh?” Anaïs asked before Harry could speak. She regarded her father with the same modicum of uncertainty that Harry was. He was _far_ too calm for what he just overheard. Harry had expected him to react with rage, and this quiet anger was somehow even more terrifying than if the alpha had been shouting.

“I will think of something appropriate,” Fenrir replied, still holding Harry in a close, protective embrace. “I have been a fool, Harry, believing that Caomh had tried to help you that night. Looking back, the lie is glaringly obvious. I cannot let this sort of action against my Alpha Bitch go unpunished, but...”

Fenrir trailed off, his expression troubled, and he heaved a sigh.

“You shouldn't banish him,” Harry interjected quickly, his small voice seeming to startle both Anaïs and Fenrir, and they both stared at him incredulously, even as Harry pushed forward to explain himself. “I know enough about werewolf culture that that's the standard punishment for massive crimes like this, but...even after what he did, he's still your son. How can he learn his lesson and redeem himself in the eyes of you and the pack if he's exiled?”

Fenrir paused for a half-beat, his eyes a little wide, as though this was an angle that he had not considered. After a moment, his expression relaxed into a small smile.

“Very astute, pet,” Fenrir replied approvingly, and offered Harry another smile, one that seemed to waver between a smirk and a genuine expression. “All right, if I am not to banish him, what shall his punishment be? What he did was serious, and you could have been killed. I won't settle for some flimsy punishment like _writing lines_.”

“Can I think on it?” Harry asked, biting his lip nervously. He didn't like the idea of punishing someone, even Caomh, but he also understood a little better how werewolf life worked now, and he could not risk Fenrir's position as alpha by insisting on a mild punishment. Maybe if he had a little more time, he could think of something that would be fair, and not too hard on Caomh.

“All right, pet,” Fenrir repeated, slipping an arm around Harry's waist and drawing him close, scenting his throat intimately, apparently uncaring that his own daughter was watching. “We have a three-day run ahead of us, maybe four. Before we get home, you are to come up with an adequate punishment for what Caomh did. But be warned—if you don't, I will deal with it myself. Understand?”

The danger now present in Fenrir's voice was unmistakable. Harry shivered, and nodded.

“Yeah, Fen,” Harry replied, “I understand.”

 

~*~

 

_What am I going to do about my son?_

That night, after running for several more miles with Harry on his back, he now watched his mate sleeping peacefully, the group of them hidden away in a copse of trees, and a smokeless fire was crackling away merrily, keeping them warm. With the temporary warding they'd set up, no one would find them, but that did little to chase away the chill that had encased Fenrir's heart. Thanks to his own child, he'd nearly lost his mate.

His anger and betrayal at what Caomh had done was well beyond anything he had ever felt before. He loved his son—despite his horrific attitude—and he loved his mate. He loved them differently, but he still loved them both.

_And Harry seemed to know that I wouldn't have the heart to banish my own child, and gave me an out without saying it so plainly,_ Fenrir thought as he watched his mate. Harry was curled up in Fenrir's arms, a blanket wound around him like a cocoon. He looked so peaceful.

Fenrir buried his nose in Harry's hair and inhaled, the scent calming his troubled mind, and the action made Harry laugh softly.

“Stop that,” Harry murmured, his voice thick with grogginess, as though he was somewhere between sleep and wakefulness.

“Why should I?”

“Because I'm exhausted, and you're making me want to do things _other_ than sleep.”

“Oh, _am_ I?”

“Yes,” Harry replied, his eyes still firmly shut, as though he was determined to go back to sleep. “ _But_ there are two things stopping me right now.”

“Only two?” Fenrir purred, his nose travelling down to Harry's throat, where his scent was stronger, and ghosted his lips over the hollow of his mate's throat, making him shiver with delight. “And what reasons are those?”

“I'm _exhausted_ ,” he repeated, “and I'm not doing anything in front of nearly all the doms in the pack.” His voice was sweetly breathless, and the sound of it certainly helped Fenrir forget his present woes over his son.

“Well, I'm certain I can make it nice and _relaxing_ for you...” Fenrir replied in the same soft tone, nipping at Harry's skin, uncaring that his sub was filthy from his time in the warehouse, how greasy his hair was, or how his scent had taken on a sharp unwashed tang. It didn't matter—it was still Harry.

“Fen, _please_ ,” Harry whined feebly, his eyes at last flicking open, and the faint laughter in his tone told Fenrir that Harry was not truly distressed by his actions. “Can't it wait until we get back? Then we can bathe together, feast, _and then_ you can shag me until I can't walk anymore...and then...and then...”

Harry trailed off. His voice had softened a little, and Fenrir understood that the jocular moment was over. His mate's mind had returned to Caomh's betrayal.

“We'll figure everything out, Harry,” Fenrir whispered, his knuckle curling under Harry's chin, and he guided his mate into a gentle kiss. “I promise.”

Harry sighed, and nodded. However, it seemed almost as though Harry did not truly believe it.

Fenrir drew his mate close, and nuzzled him affectionately. Harry was quick to drop back to sleep, but Fenrir lay awake for much longer, his mind still caught in a snare of conflicted worry.

 


	21. Home Again

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Next update is scheduled for March 31st. Happy St. Paddy's Day!

Chapter Twenty-One – Home Again

 

The trek home took much longer than Fenrir had expected, and it was _all Harry's fault_.

Five days of hauling his bitchy mate on his back, and five days of listening to Harry complain that he could walk on his own.

Fenrir had heard that particular piece of bullshit far too many times to fall for it _again_.

“Shut up and look at the trees, you cranky arse,” he retorted with a low grumble every time, and the little demon would wrap his arms around Fenrir's neck and squirm in the piggyback hold, as though hoping that his supposedly innocent movements might convince Fenrir to put him down for a little while.

It didn't work, but feeling Harry willingly grind into him like that was _certainly_ an improvement from the last trip they'd taken like this.

_Perhaps when we got home, I could tie Harry to the bed for a little while,_ Fenrir mused, and smirked to himself at all the delicious scene that bloomed in his mind at the very thought. At least that would be _one_ way to get his pain-in-the-arse mate to behave.

However, despite his nigh constant string of sexual thoughts concerning Harry, he had not yet forgotten what awaited them when they got home—dealing with Caomh.

“Have you come up with an acceptable punishment for your stepson?” Fenrir asked on their final evening out in the wilderness, and Harry scrunched up his nose in displeasure at the wording. However, this time Fenrir's goal had not been an intent to make Harry uncomfortable, but merely remind him of the importance of the coming interaction.

“I think so. You can tell me if it's not enough, right?” Harry asked, his worried gaze flickering in an out of the firelight as they lay there, the rest of the hunting party fast asleep around them, and Fenrir gently hugged his mate closer.

“You know I will,” Fenrir promised, and leant in to offer his mate a tender kiss.

Harry let out something akin to a soft purr, paired with a whine of longing. Fenrir knew Harry was not entirely comfortable with being intimate in front of others of the pack, which was a shame, really—Fenrir _really_ missed feeling his mate's supple form writhe beneath him.

“So, pet, tell me of your idea,” Fenrir prompted in a bid to distract himself, and Harry smiled shyly, as though he was almost reluctant to actually answer him.

“Well...erm...” Harry trailed off, his expression conflicted and nervous. Fenrir rubbed Harry's arms gently, but his mate did not appear wholly calmed by his touch. After a moment of hesitation however, he at last began to speak.

“I thought of putting him in temporary exile,” Harry said, his gaze averted from Fenrir as he spoke. “Like...sending him to the edges of the territory to fend for himself for a season, maybe to show him how bad life would be without a pack, with maybe...a guard to make sure he doesn't run off. Then invite him back—if he wants to come back, that is.”

“So, something akin to an imprisonment?” Fenrir asked, and Harry nodded.

“So...er...what d'you think?” Harry asked hesitantly, and Fenrir smirked as he leant in to nuzzle at the crook of Harry's neck, making his mate shiver.

“I think it could work.”

 

~*~

 

Remus had not quite known what to anticipate when Andromeda had put Teddy down for his nap, and she unveiled to him the truth of all that had occurred since his kidnapping.

He had anticipated fallout from the war, or news that Greyback had done something truly _awful_ to Harry. Perhaps something that might explain Harry's disturbing fondness for the infamous werewolf, or maybe the agony the Order had endured of restructuring the Ministry, and weeding out the bad elements therein.

What he heard instead was more horrifying, more baffling, and more confusing than anything he had heretofore anticipated.

“All right, let me see if I understand this,” Remus said, pinching the bridge of his nose for a moment before he glanced back up to Andromeda, who was regarding him sadly. “Who told you all of this? Can we trust them?”

“Minerva,” Andromeda supplied. “I do not believe she would lie about something like this.”

“No, I agree, I don't believe she would,” Remus said readily, though that did little to cheer him. The whole story still sounded wildly implausible to him. “You say that Harry left the battle _of his own accord_ after hearing the prophecy of his death—that I can understand. He was seventeen, now eighteen, and it is a lot to ask of someone so young. Had I known what Dumbledore had planned, I like to think that I would have tried to stop him. It must have been a terrible burden to bear...and to bear it alone, I cannot blame Harry in the _least_ for how he reacted.

“But then you say he somehow entangles himself with Fenrir Greyback,” Remus continued, shaking his head in disbelief. “That part I _don't_ understand. He would know better than to get close to such a man, and _then_ the next time he is seen is at some random, unknown B&B on the outskirts of London with two unknown werewolves? Then he is kidnapped, and—and...”

Remus could not finish. What Andromeda told him was too disgusting and horrible to repeat.

Andromeda did not try to defend what had happened. She merely bowed her head sadly.

“I was unaware of their plans, and so was Minerva,” Andromeda said. “By the time she reached Grimmauld Place, it was too late to save Harry's cubs. Those involved were either killed by Greyback in a grief-fuelled rage, or, in Molly's case, imprisoned by her own family. Molly still believes she was correct, doing what she did, and she still believes that Harry would never have wanted the cubs. She is a deluded, sick woman. I cannot _fathom_ how she can justify her actions, but...oh, poor Harry was _destroyed_ afterwards. Kingsley even tried to sterilize him, but Minerva and Poppy both knew that the organs would just grow back on their own within a few lunar cycles—you know how powerful the restorative power of werewolf blood can be.”

“I wish I knew what to say,” Remus said, his hands clenching around the edge of the blanket he was still covered with. “These people have known me, known _Harry_ for years. What right do they have to treat him like an animal? To decide what he does with his own body? How can they take away his autonomy like that? When I saw him, it was clear to me that he was not confused, he knew his own mind. Harry is one of the kindest souls I have ever known—not even in his darkest hour would he have the heart to kill a child, no matter where it came from.”

“No, I agree,” Andromeda said, “Harry would never wish for such a senseless, heartless death. However, I must admit that I'm surprised that you're not more angry,” she admitted, arching a brow as she watched him. “I expected a much stronger reaction from you.”

“I _am_ angry,” Remus said, frowning at her. “I'm _furious_. These people, whom I had assumed were my friends, they treated Harry—now one of my own kind— _abysmally._ They showed quite plainly that they held absolutely no regard for Harry's opinion, simply because of his species. It has shown me that they never truly accepted werewolves in their midst; they merely _tolerated us_. It is infuriating, disheartening, and...it is so many things. I cannot name them all.

“ _But_ ,” Remus continued, “I also see who our true friends and allies are, and honestly, though I want to go to Azkaban and give Molly a piece of my mind, I am simply _too tired_.” Remus felt himself deflate a little, and he cast his gaze down to his lap in shame for his own weakness. In truth, he feared coming face to face with the woman who had destroyed Harry's life in one single instant. He did not wish to see what Molly Weasley had become. “Perhaps when some of my strength returns, so will my desire to fight.”

“You may stay here and rest as long as you like, Remus,” Andromeda added without missing a beat. “I will have the guest room bed made up for you, and you will stay here until your strength returns. There is no longer a need to rush off; the battle is over. We are safe. You can spend as much time with little Teddy as you like.”

_The battle is over._

Remus could still hardly believe it.

 

~*~

 

Despite Harry's desperate protests that he could walk now, and there was no need for Fenrir to carry him around, his mate happily ignored him. After breakfast, he promptly hefted Harry onto his back, once more in the piggyback position, while he ignored Harry's grumbling as they set off.

“We run faster than you can,” Fenrir pointed out for the dozenth time, and Harry hated that it was true. “Even _with_ my wilful sack of grain on my back, we'll get home faster if I carry you.”

“ _Wilful sack of grain...!_ ” Harry cried indignantly, and felt a modicum of satisfaction when he spotted Fenrir wince from his high tone. “You take that back, you git. I am _not_ a sack of grain.”

“Sack of _something_ ,” Fenrir grumbled, and Harry rolled his eyes as he linked his arms around Fenrir's neck, and he propped his chin on Fenrir's big, bulky shoulder.

“Behave yourself, Mister Alpha, or I might not be _up_ for celebrating our glorious return tonight,” Harry warned, and Fenrir huffed, as though he didn't believe him.

Which was fair, given that Harry had _every intention_ of celebrating his return home in a space that was theirs, and out of sight of the other pack members.

Harry nuzzled absentmindedly as the crook of Fenrir's neck, bathing in his strong, dominant scent. Harry tried to banish his annoyance at being carried for five days straight, while his mate chuckled warmly at his actions. The talk of sex was a blessed reprieve from what was to come when they got back, when Harry and Fenrir needed to confront Caomh at last.

 

~*~

 

Their return to the territory at midday was met, none too surprisingly, with celebration.

Fenrir at last let his grumpy mate down, and he watched Harry walk slowly into the mass of subs, all of whom were excitedly greeting him.

In response, Harry offered each of them a tired smile, though he lingered a little longer with Shannon and his girls, Dustin not too far behind. There was a look of comprehension in Harry's eyes, one which Fenrir was certain had something to do with his silly little mate finally figuring out just how badly his imprisonment had weakened him.

“Oh, Harry, you're skin and bone!” Xiang chastised in a warm, grandmotherly fashion when Harry reached her. “We'll have to make sure the pack cooks make _plenty_ for you to eat, to fatten you up again!”

“Fenrir fed me pretty well during our travel back to the territory,” Harry offered, smiling fondly as he spoke to the older woman, and she scoffed.

“Oh, I'm certain, but now that you're home we can dig into our stores and give you a _real_ meal,” she said. “Alpha always looks after his own, I believe that, but now you're home, and there is _nothing_ for you to worry about anymore.”

“Yeah,” Harry agreed. “For good, this time.”

Fenrir smirked a little, and he watched as all the subs around the alpha bitch began to cheer enthusiastically at this news.

All, save one.

Fenrir's eyes slid over to his son, who appeared positively dumbstruck at Harry's return. More than that, Fenrir watched as Caomh's eyes met his, and all colour immediately drained from his face.

Caomh knew what was going to happen.

“Make sure he doesn't run off,” he muttered to Anaïs, and she nodded grimly, stepping back from Fenrir, and circled the main area of the territory as soundlessly as any predator. When Caomh turned away, presumably to run off, he nearly jumped out of his skin when he spotted his sister standing right behind him.

“Bring forward the accused!”

Fenrir's booming call seemed to suck the sound from the territory as everyone went quiet in an instant, barring a few confused and panicked whispers.

“ _Accused?”_

“ _Does that mean someone hurt Alpha Bitch?”_

“ _What's going on?”_

“ _Accused!”_

“ _This can't be right, can it?”_

The whispers went on, but Fenrir ignored them as he stepped forward, looping a supportive arm around Harry while Anaïs half-dragged a fighting Caomh forward, who looked petrified.

Fenrir tried to ignore the churning guilt in his stomach, and the flash of images that jumped to the forefront of his mind—this was his _son_. His youngest son. Fenrir had watched him grow up, and had been there for almost every scraped knee and encouraging hug. He'd stayed in constant contact with Caomh during his time in Azkaban, as he had with all his other children. Where had he gone wrong? Why was this happening?

Fenrir swallowed thickly, and refused to let his emotion show on his face. To exhibit weakness and lenience now would be detrimental to his station within the pack.

“Caomh Greyback,” Fenrir addressed his petrified son, and felt a modicum of relief over the fact that no emotion escaped in his tone. “You have been accused by the Alpha Bitch of this pack of attack when he was at his weakest, and chasing him from the territory, where he was kidnapped by poachers, and thus nearly lost his life. Do you deny these claims?”

“Dad, he's lying, you _have_ to know that!” Caomh cried, struggling as Anaïs forced him to his knees, and held him there. “I tried to _help_ him, I told you that!”

“You have hated my mate since I first brought him here, and I was foolish enough to believe your lies,” Fenrir replied, keeping his voice even as he stared down at his son. “I have no reason to trust you—you have broken the bond of father and son, almost irrecoverably.”

“Dad, _please..._ ” Caomh begged, his voice cracking a little, the fear upon his face beginning to shift to blind panic. Fenrir felt decidedly sick at the sight of it.

“Harry,” Fenrir said, addressing his mate, and looking away from his child. “Step forward.”

Fenrir watched Harry swallow, his arms tense at his sides as he stepped away from Fenrir to stare down at Caomh. His expression was blank and impassive, though Fenrir could still feel the nervous tension radiating off of Harry as he regarded the other wolf.

“Caomh, I don't know what I did to make you hate me,” Harry began, his voice eerily level, despite the clear emotion behind his words. “Admittedly, at first, I had a hard time, and didn't really want to get to know the pack, but that feeling has long since passed. Despite this, you still treated me like a vile thing that you wanted gone.

“I am Alpha Bitch, I am second to Fenrir, I am his mate, and have no desire to act as a replacement for...anyone. It would be completely ridiculous for me to try and _parent_ you, when you are twelve years older than me, and an adult in every respect.

“But now,” Harry continued, “I find myself in a position where I am expected to punish you for the crimes you have committed against me. It is a task I do not take lightly, and I did not wish to give you a punishment that would offer an opportunity for you to learn from your mistakes, and atone.

“That said, I give you my sentence—you are to be banished to the outlying territories of our home until Spring. A sentry will be on guard to ensure that you do not run off, or try to sneak back home. You will be on your own, without us, and you must fend for yourself. No one will aid you in the search of food, shelter, or water.”

Harry paused as he gazed down at Caomh, his eyes hard and conflicted, while Caomh seemed caught between shock and fear.

“Know this, Caomh—this is a taste of what is to come if you do not change,” Harry said firmly. “You have an opportunity here to change your ways and still have your family. If you continue on this path, it only leads to pain. I do not think a full exile from the pack will help you. Prove me right.”

 

~*~

 

Harry held Caomh's gaze in silent challenge. He did not blink, but neither did Caomh look away. The condemned wolf stared resolutely back, unwilling to bend to a leader whom he refused to acknowledge.

Fenrir shifted behind Harry, clearly agitated by the tension, but Harry laid a hand on the dominant's arm in a silent bid to stop him from intervening. He cared for Fenrir—maybe even _loved_ him—but he did not need his dominant to fight his battles for him. If he didn't do this now, Caomh would always look down on him.

And, as Harry already knew, Fenrir would not always be there to protect him. He needed to show not just Caomh, but the entire pack that he was fully capable of defending himself when needed.

After several long, tense moments, Caomh let out a snarl of fury as he looked away. Despite this, the movement was grudging, and in no way a genuine submission to Harry.

Harry relaxed a little, easing back against Fenrir's warmth while the alpha ordered Anaïs to have Caomh taken away, and he assigned one of the single dominants, a man named Karl, to be Caomh's sentry.

Harry watched in tired silence, staying close to Fenrir, even as the crowd began to disperse, muttering to one another as they moved, their expressions a mixture of shock and bemusement, though Harry could not tell whether or not this was a good thing. At the very least, none of the other pack members seemed to think that Harry was falsely accusing Caomh of anything, which was a relief.

Caomh, in contrast to how he usually was, was quiet as he was led away. His face was white, as though he still expected someone to speak out in his defence. However, no one did, not even his courting partner.

Xavier was sat by the bonfire, his eyes on the ground. He refused to look up as Caomh was taken away, and there were tears in the young dominant's eyes. Harry felt his stomach churn with guilt.

“You didn't do anything wrong, pet,” Fenrir rumbled from behind him, a thick arm winding around Harry's waist, and he tugged him flush against his chest, his words and actions comforting, as though he could sense Harry's guilty conscience. Harry shivered with a confusing sort of delight at the closeness of his mate, while at the same time found himself uncertain whether it was proper to feel so joyous after what had just transpired.

“I took away his mate,” Harry said, turning around in Fenrir's arms, and the alpha smiled a little, the expression warm and welcoming as he leant in to press a tender kiss to Harry's lips.

“No, Harry, you didn't,” Fenrir said softly. “You faced off with one who would upset our peace here— _your peace—_ and you laid out a much fairer punishment than most would have done. By the time the first flowers of spring begin to bloom, I am certain that even Caomh will understand your motives. If Xavier chooses to return to him or not, that is out of your hands. You would have hurt him more by doing nothing, that I believe.”

Harry nodded, though he wasn't certain if he believed Fenrir's words. He couldn't help but feel like he'd somehow taken Caomh away from Xavier, but by the same token, he knew that letting Caomh get away with nearly killing him was well and truly out of the question.

As Fenrir had said, it was out of his hands.

 

“Can we...go to our cabin for a bit?” Harry asked softly, his cheeks flushing with embarrassment at his soft tone. “I mean, not for a shag. I just want to lie down for a bit. I'm really tired all of a sudden.”

“Of course, pet,” Fenrir replied, smiling with an odd look of triumph on his face as the dominant swept Harry off his feet, and carried him back to their cabin without another word.

 


	22. New Moon

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Next update is scheduled for April 14th. Enjoy!
> 
>  
> 
> **NOTE: Due to 8 of my stories being stolen by fictionhunt in the span of a week, as of now all my works are being restricted to Registered AO3 users only, in order to minimize something like this happening again. I'm sorry for any inconvenience that this causes.**

Chapter Twenty-Two – New Moon

 

Fenrir lay stretched out in bed, his eyes shut as he rested, not quite willing to get up just yet. He was awake much earlier than he would have liked, thanks in no small part to the painfully annoying scratching of Harry's quill, presumably writing Lupin— _again._

Fenrir fought the urge to grind his teeth as he lay there listening to the sound of Harry contacting another dominant wolf—one who _wasn't_ him. It was bad enough that Harry was trying to befriend Xavier, but _Lupin_ as well?

Unfortunately, Fenrir now knew better than to comment on it, but it didn't stop his jealousy from boiling just beneath the surface.

 

“ _What're you doing?” Fenrir asked, bowing over Harry, who was seated by the bonfire, and his sub giggled warmly, dividing his time between a scroll of parchment across his knees, and a platter of food next to him. The whole pack was keen for Harry's strength to return, and as a result they had been all but force-feeding him a constant stream of food ever since he got back._

“ _Just writing Remus,” Harry replied, reaching up to rub one of Fenrir's arms as he spoke, almost in reassurance, though that didn't help to quell the burgeoning coil of jealousy in the pit of Fenrir's stomach very much. “I wanted to check in, make sure he knows I'm all right...and I want to invite him for the next moon.”_

_Fenrir let out a low growl, and Harry glanced up to eye his mate suspiciously._

“ _What?”_

“ _Nothing,” Fenrir said quickly, his tone downtrodden and gruff, making Harry's eyes narrow._

“ _You're lying to me,” Harry accused, his tone making it clear that he was annoyed, but not hurt. “What's wrong with Remus?”_

“ _He's a wizard.”_

“ _No he's not, he's a werewolf—like us.”_

“ _Fine,” Fenrir conceded reluctantly, “maybe_ technically _he's a werewolf, but he was raised by wizards. And he's a single dominant wolf—”_

“— _oh, don't you_ even _go there, Mr Alpha!” Harry interrupted angrily as he whirled around, scattering bits of food everywhere when the platter was upended, but continued to cling tightly to the parchment and quill like it was some sort of lifeline. Harry did not seem to notice the mess he'd made, his angry gaze fixed entirely upon his mate. “Remus is like a_ father _to me, you berk, he's not..._ competition _. He's the only parental figure I haven't lost yet, and if you even_ hint _at making me choose between you two, I swear by all that is holy, you will regret it.”_

 

The memory still stung, and Fenrir hated his underlying jealousy over the whole thing. He'd never had this problem with Lukas. Lukas hadn't needed people outside of the pack like Harry did, and now Harry was even talking of contacting his friends directly—at least, the ones who hadn't betrayed him—and had even hinted that he wanted to give his friends the coordinates to their territory's Apparition Point.

Fenrir had quashed this musing immediately, refusing to let wizards into the territory, which, predictably, caused another argument between them.

Why couldn't the pack be enough for him?

Fenrir was only vaguely aware of the ceasing of the quill scratching, too caught up in his thoughts to notice, nor did he feel the bed shift ever so slightly. To his dismay, he jumped when Harry's lips suddenly brushed over his in a light kiss, making his mate laugh softly.

“Did I scare you?” Harry murmured, and when Fenrir at last opened his eyes, he found that his mate was smiling.

“Of course not,” Fenrir replied gruffly, drawing Harry closer as he spoke. “I knew what you were up to the whole time.”

“You are _such_ a bad liar,” Harry teased, smiling as he coaxed Fenrir onto his back, and climbed on top of him. Fenrir smirked, allowing his mate to assume the position. Ever since Harry had gotten back, he'd been more bold, and almost domineering in the bedroom. Amongst the pack it was another story—he seemed content to let Fenrir be the more visibly dominant partner, but alone Harry seemed to revel in being able to do this—almost like he _needed_ it.

And Fenrir, far from balk at his mate's attitude, welcomed it.

Anything to make Harry feel safe and secure.

 

~*~

 

Harry smiled; sitting perched on his mate like this made him feel _good_. The last few weeks, Fenrir had been wearing deeply unattractive grey boxer briefs to bed, though by his attitude when he put them on, it gave Harry the impression that Fenrir was unused to going to bed while wearing clothes of any kind.

Harry didn't quite know what it meant, but in that particular instance it was of grave annoyance to him, given that they were intercepting him from claiming his prize.

He rotated his hips, grinding down into Fenrir, and the alpha male let out a soft growl, his eyes sparkling with arousal as he gazed up at Harry.

“Don't you start unless you plan to finish, pet,” Fenrir warned, “this close to the moon...it'd be difficult for me to stop myself.”

“But not impossible,” Harry countered, his voice breathy as he bowed forward to kiss Fenrir's lips lightly, revelling in the way the dominant's short beard tickled his cheek. “You've stopped yourself loads of times before.”

“Not by choice,” Fenrir replied, his voice smooth and even—to Harry's surprise, he didn't sound at all frustrated by Harry's slow acclimation to life with the pack again following everything that happened with Caomh. It was freeing to know that Fenrir did not hold Harry's skittish attitude against him, and despite his clear frustration, he never once complained or tried to make Harry continue when he hadn't wanted to, or hadn't been able to.

“Lucky for you, I have no intention to stop this morning,” Harry said, and his smile broadened into a grin when Fenrir's eyes almost seemed to glow.

“Ride me, baby,” Fenrir purred, and Harry felt his skin grow hot with need at his mate's words.

 

The pair hastened out of their bedclothes, tossing them haphazardly to the cabin floor, and Harry felt his mouth water at the sight of his mate's thick, erect cock standing at attention, as though it was merely waiting for him to proceed.

“I love your cock, do you know that?” Harry said, his hand closing over the base of it, and Fenrir let out a soft growl of need. “It's so _thick_ , and _long..._ I love feeling it so deep in me, like I might choke on it.”

“Show me how much you love it, pet,” Fenrir commanded, watching Harry with an almost predatory look in his eyes, though he did not move, pointedly waiting for Harry to choose how they proceeded.

Harry felt another thrill course through him—arousal, paired with an odd sense of joy. He felt so _good_ when Fenrir let him have his way like this. It made him feel confident and safe, like Fenrir was truly the man he'd discovered him to be—a good mate, and a good alpha.

But most of all, he was a man whom Harry could trust implicitly.

Harry shifted higher until he was straddling his mate's hips. He leant in to grab the lubricant off the bedside table, and in the same breath he devoured Fenrir's mouth in a needy kiss.

Fenrir responded with another growl, his arm winding around Harry's waist, holding him gently, but firmly, while their lips parted almost in sync as their tongues tasted each other, and Harry trembled as he felt Fenrir gently pluck the little jar of lubricant from his hand, while never once breaking the kiss.

“Let me make you ready, pet,” Fenrir purred, and Harry nodded, dazed by the heady kiss.

Harry watched as Fenrir opened the jar of lubricant and dipped his thick fingers in. His eyes never left Harry's; they were clouded with lust, but so too was there a softness in his gaze that he only ever reserved for Harry—a love that he never voiced, but was there regardless.

Fenrir sealed the jar and set it aside, going at an infuriatingly slow pace as he regarded Harry.

At last, his hand encircled the sub's narrow hips, and Harry curved his spine, exposing himself for his mate, and he moaned as Fenrir's big, weathered hand brushed his exposed entrance.

“God, you feel so good...” Harry said with a moan, tilting his head back as Fenrir's fingers circled his hole, smearing it with lubricant, before he at last pushed a single digit in, making Harry groan again.

“Have you been thinking about your next heat, pet?” Fenrir purred as his finger slowly delved deeper. “When you make your own slick? When the heat fills you and all you want is relief? My cock? My cum?”

“Yes, yes,” Harry moaned, his head thrown back, shuddering as a thin sheen of sweat closed over his skin, while Fenrir added a second finger. “Fill me, my mate, my dominant, make me _swell_...”

Fenrir did not respond to Harry's final plea, as though he knew Harry meant to swell with child, and not arousal. Harry still wanted it, Harry still _needed_ it, but Fenrir's silence did not tell him whether or not his mate was ready to try again so soon.

Instead of possibly ruining the moment with a _talk_ , Harry forced himself to be quiet—there would be time enough for heart-to-hearts _after_ sex.

Harry waited until Fenrir deemed him sufficiently prepared before he at last fixed his eyes on his mate, waited for him to remove his fingers, then eased down on Fenrir's cock.

Fenrir let out a low growl, as though he'd somehow forgotten the vicelike sensation of Harry's arse. It had hardly been the first time they'd fucked since Harry had gotten back—or the hundredth, if Harry was being honest with himself—but every time Fenrir seemed surprised by how _tight_ Harry was.

Harry smiled to himself, pleased, but also amused by Fenrir's reaction. He rocked his hips as Fenrir touched his waist, holding him steady, and he let out a soft grunt of pleasure as Harry began to move.

“ _Fuck_ , Harry...” Fenrir groaned, shifting beneath Harry to follow his movements as the sub lifted off and slammed back down on Fenrir's cock, and Harry smirked to himself, revelling in the power he felt of being able to reduce such a strong, powerful dominant so effectively into a pile of goo, and little more.

“Feel good, love?” Harry panted as he continued to move, and Fenrir grunted, his head inclining in a vague nod.

“If you stop, Harry, I swear by the Moon...” Fenrir began to growl, but trailed off when Harry chuckled warmly.

“Don't worry, Fen,” Harry reassured him, “I've no plans to stop this short.”

Harry resumed his movements with renewed vigour. Fenrir seemed to be trying to control himself and not take charge, and Harry felt his heart swell even more at the sight of Fenrir's self-restraint.

“Let go for me, my dominant, my alpha,” Harry said, panting hard as he continued to fuck himself on Fenrir's delicious cock. “ _Cum for me..._ ”

Fenrir let out a sound akin to a snarl as he tightened his hold on Harry's hips, almost to the point of pain as he arched his hips, thrusting as deeply into Harry as he could go, making Harry cry out as he felt a warm heat fill him as Fenrir came.

Almost in the same breath, Fenrir closed his hand over Harry's cock, pulling him to orgasm. Harry groaned, cum dotting his abdomen before he slumped forward, burrowing himself into Fenrir's arms as he slowly came down from his post-orgasmic high.

“God,” Harry panted, “I _love_ the day of the full moon.”

Fenrir barked a laugh, and Harry grinned before he drew his mate into another heated, heart-stopping kiss.

 

~*~

 

As far as full moons went, Remus felt as though this was the worst one he'd experienced in recent memory.

And the moon hadn't even _risen_ yet.

Remus paced, his eyes on the sky. There was still at least two hours until sunset; he'd done everything he needed to do to prepare, and keep his family safe. He'd taken his potion (supplied by somewhat grudgingly by Horace Slughorn at Minerva's request), and he and Andromeda set up a large cage constructed of thick silver bars in the basement, should something go wrong with the potion.

And yet, it was the worst, because Teddy would not stop _screaming_.

Teddy had started crying when they got up that morning, and despite Remus's best efforts over the last few hours, he had not stopped screaming since.

He was fed, he had a clean nappy on, and he was not ill—of this, Remus was certain, and yet, he was still screaming bloody murder.

“Teddy, please,” Remus croaked weakly as he paced, rubbing the baby's back, “what's the matter? Why are you crying? I'm your dad, I _should_ be able to figure out what's the matter with you...”

He ran through the list again—did he want a toy? Was he teething? Was he hurt?

The answer was no—he hadn't wanted a toy, he seemed wildly uninterested in teether toys as well as his dummy, and Remus's basic diagnostic spells told him that his son was fine.

“Maybe it's something else...” Remus mused over Teddy's continued cries. “The diagnostic spells would have told me if it was colic or something of that nature...maybe...maybe...oh, Teddy, just stop crying, _please_? For me?”

Of course, Teddy did not respond beyond crying even more loudly, and Remus let out a miserable sigh as he rubbed Teddy's back, hugging the infant close to inhale his fresh baby smell.

In that instance, Remus discovered what was wrong.

His son did not smell like a human baby.

What Remus scented now was nothing but the sharp tang of _wolf_.

 _No_.

Remus was weeping, though he was uncertain when exactly he began. Blind panic replaced his exhaustion, and in the same breath, he was only dimly aware of someone crying his name.

“Remus! _Remus!_ ”

The voice dragged Remus slowly out of his fog of panic. When he blinked, he found himself in Andromeda's living room, a screaming Teddy still in his arms.

“What?” Remus asked, shaking his head a little. “What happened?”

“I was _trying_ to ask you the same question,” Andromeda countered, her eyes wide with fear and worry. “You wandered in here looking as though someone's _died_ , and you're crying. Tell me what's the matter, is Teddy all right?”

“I—he—it's...” Remus shook his head, but it did not help to clear it. He glanced to the window, and hissed a curse. There was probably an hour until sunset, if he was lucky. How had he managed to miss a whole _hour_?

“It's T-Teddy,” he forced out at last. “He's not like Dora like we thought...I...he's—he's like _me_.”

“What...” Andromeda began, trailing off as her eyes went wide, and understanding eclipsed her features.

“I can't let him change,” Remus said as he began to pace again. “I—I _can't_. I can't put him through so much pain. I _won't_ let him become like me.”

“Remus,” Andromeda said gently, her voice almost imperceptible above Teddy's continued screams. “You know it's too late for that now—”

“— _No!_ ” Remus insisted, his heart clenching at the mere _prospect_ of sitting back and accepting his son's fate. “I won't hurt him. I _won't_ let him go through something like this.”

“Remus, be reasonable!” Andromeda snapped, her voice jumping from soothing to sharp so rapidly that Remus stopped dead in his tracks and turned to face her.

“Now, you listen to me, you ridiculous man,” Andromeda said, her voice just barely below shouting, though it seemed to Remus that she was doing it to ensure that Remus heard her over Teddy's cries, and not because she was truly angry. “Teddy needs you right now. He needs you to calm down and think of _him_ , not what you want or do not want for him. If you try to forcibly stop the change, you will _hurt your son_. Right now, he needs you to put your personal feelings on the matter aside. I know you want to help him, but sometimes we need to swallow our pride and go to someone who has _experience_ in these matters, regardless how much or how little we might want to see them.”

“Andromeda!” Remus cried, aghast. “You can't possibly be implying that I take him to—”

“You _know_ he can be trusted,” Andromeda interrupted calmly, her voice reassuring, though Remus did not feel very _reassured_ at the present moment. “Hermione, Neville, most of the Weasleys, even Minerva McGonagall has vouched for him. You can trust that he will know how to best help your son.”

He needed Fenrir Greyback's help.

But _how_ could he go to such a man, the one who turned him, turned Harry, ruined so many lives, and, worst of all, sided with Voldemort?

Remus shifted his gaze to poor little Teddy. He was red-faced and crying, flailing his little fists, and seemed to be more distressed than Remus thought possible for such a small child.

_Sometimes we need to swallow our pride and go to someone who has experience in these matters, regardless how much or how little we might want to see them._

Remus glanced at Andromeda, and ground his teeth.

“I'll be back in the morning.”

Without waiting, Remus turned and raced from the house, holding Teddy close as he focused, and with a twist of his body, Disapparated.

 

~*~

 

Harry was sprawled on the grass by the bonfire, smiling indulgently as Fenrir held him to his chest, and he was teasing the hem of Harry's shirt, as though he had half a mind to sweep Harry up and carry him off to their cabin for one more quickie before moonrise.

“Good day?” Fenrir purred in his ear, and Harry laughed.

“ _Best_ day,” he confirmed. “I can't remember the last time I've felt this good.”

“Hmm...I bet I can make it better...” Fenrir purred into his ear, and Harry snorted.

“ _Again?_ ” he asked, “I think my poor arse needs a break.”

“I've never known it to give out before,” Fenrir teased, giving Harry's arse a pinch, and making him yelp, halfheartedly trying to wiggle away from his mate, while the other pack members looked on, and many of them rolled their eyes at the antics of their leaders.

A sharp crack cut through the peace of the territory, stopping Fenrir and Harry's play short. Harry recognized the sound as someone Apparating close by, but it was clear that most of the other werewolves did not know what it was, as many cried out and whipped around, looking for the source of the noise.

Harry and Fenrir were on their feet in an instant, and Harry tugged out his wand while simultaneously ignoring the way Fenrir rolled his eyes, as though he thought such a tool was useless. Harry ignored him, his eyes scanning the greenery for the possible threat, when new sounds joined the cacophony—someone crashing through the foliage, and a baby crying.

Harry exchanged a bemused look with Fenrir, just as a familiar form hastened through the trees, his face chalk-white, and a screaming baby in his arms.

Harry felt Fenrir relax a little next to him, but he was still on his guard, his expression hinting at his confusion as to how Remus could have Apparated here.

In truth, Harry had noted the Apparition Point coordinates to Remus some weeks earlier in one of his letters. He'd done it in a vain hope that Remus would use them to come for the full moon, though when it appeared as though Remus would not come, Harry hadn't bothered to tell Fenrir what he'd done. Now seemed that not telling Fenrir had been something of a bad idea, but thankfully, it did not appear as though Fenrir intended to attack Remus when he had a distraught cub in his arms.

A few of the dominants who did not recognize Remus moved to shield Harry from the supposed threat, but Harry caught their eyes and shook his head in a silent command, and they understood, backing off quickly, just as Remus's gaze found him, and he staggered forward.

“Harry,” he panted as he reached him, his voice just barely audible over the baby's cries. “Please, help me.”

 


	23. Tension

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Next update is April 28th. Enjoy! :)

Chapter Twenty-Three – Tension

 

Harry stared, at a loss for what Remus was asking of him.

“What d'you mean?” Harry asked uncertainly, just barely audible above Teddy's screams, while Remus appeared to be almost on the verge of tears. “What d'you want me to do?”

“Get him to Marie,” Fenrir advised softly. “The cub is going to turn tonight—I can smell it. She has the salves that will ease the muscle pains, and they should help him to stop crying.”

Harry was mildly startled by the kind suggestion, considering Fenrir had always made his position on Remus _very_ clear. However, at the risk of drawing out poor Teddy's suffering, Harry forced himself to shelve his surprise to examine later, after Teddy had calmed down.

“Right, okay,” Harry said, relaxing a little, understanding both the suggestion, and why Remus looked so petrified. Of course the man would be distraught to see his child go through something he still hated about himself. At the same moment, Harry recalled Fenrir telling him that werewolves were typically born in their wolf forms, and confusion momentarily overwhelmed him—if Teddy was a werewolf, why wasn't he born as one? Why was it only happening _now_?

“Er, c'mon, Remus,” Harry said with a small shake of his head, attempting to put aside his confusion for the moment. “We'll get him to the pack healer; she has some stuff that might help soothe him.”

None too surprisingly, Fenrir did not sit back and let Harry go, but followed behind, and when Harry glanced back, he saw that Fenrir was glaring suspiciously at Remus.

Harry fought the urge to roll his eyes; was Fenrir _still_ on that?

They made it to the healer's cabin, and Marie and Aidan's eyes both went wide when they caught sight of the three wolves and the screaming infant.

“Good gracious!” Marie cried, dropping the book in her hands directly on Aidan's foot in her surprise. “What on earth is going on here?”

Aidan yelped before he had the good sense to bite his knuckle to stifle his cry of pain, then hopped away almost comically, likely to get something for his injury.

“This is Remus,” Harry explained quickly. “His son is having his first change tonight. Think you have anything to help him?”

“Oh, I see,” Marie said, and nodded, “Come with me, Remus, I have some salves that should help to relax him.”

Remus cast an uncertain eye to Harry, and Harry smiled encouragingly.

“Go on,” Harry said, “you're both safe here, I swear—and I promise that I won't leave this spot until you two are ready to leave, all right?”

Remus stayed frozen for another moment longer, but the screaming cub in his arms seemed to spur him onward, and he followed Marie reluctantly.

When Remus was out of earshot, Fenrir snorted softly.

“ _I won't leave this spot_ ,” Fenrir mimicked in a high voice, and Harry swatted his arm lightly, though it did nothing to deter Fenrir's amusement. “What does he think you're going to do? One good gust of wind would knock you both over.”

“Don't be an arse,” Harry warned. “He's really freaked out by being here; don't make it worse.”

“I don't like him being here,” Fenrir grumbled. “He's not one of us.”

“He's family,” Harry insisted. “The cub in his arms? That's Teddy, my godson. He stays as long as he likes— _no_ arguments.”

“Well, the cub's definitely a wolf, even if his father's a poor excuse of one,” Fenrir conceded grudgingly. “He's got a real set of lungs on him.”

Harry frowned, not liking Fenrir's jibes towards Remus, and focused his energy instead on listening to Remus fret, Marie try to calm him, and Teddy's continuing cries. He wasn't sure how to make Fenrir stop, or if he even could, given how close the moon was. It'd be difficult to calm his domineering instincts right now, and perhaps it should wait until after the moon fully set.

 _I'll kick his arse after the moon sets, by then he'll have no excuse for being a git to Remus,_ Harry thought as he smirked to himself.

“You know,” Harry said, once again trying to defuse the situation, despite the futility of it, “what I don't get is why Teddy's only turning now. He's...six months old, I think, and you told me ages ago that werewolves are born in their wolf form, remember?”

A grief-stricken look crossed Fenrir and Harry's expressions, recalling the horrible circumstances from which that particular discussion came about. Thankfully Teddy's crying calmed at the same moment, and Remus meandered out of the area of the sickbeds, holding an exhausted cub against his chest. Remus himself looked about ready to fall over, and Harry offered him a reassuring smile, though it seemed to do little to calm Remus as his eyes slid over to Fenrir, and narrowed slightly.

“Have you eaten?” Harry asked as he did his best to divert attention away from his mate, though despite Remus's gaze fixing once more on Harry, the tension did not wane.

“No,” Remus replied with a vague shrug, as though it did not matter. “I'm not supposed to eat after I take my last wolfsbane dose.”

“That explains a lot,” Fenrir muttered darkly, and Harry elbowed his mate, but Fenrir ignored him.

“Taking wolfsbane is being _responsible_ ,” Remus countered icily while his arms visibly tensed around Teddy, as though he thought someone might reach out and snatch him away. “I won't allow myself or my son to become a monster just because of what _you_ did to us.”

Though Harry knew that the words were directed at Fenrir, Harry still felt it in his stomach like he'd been punched. Behind him, he could all but _hear_ Fenrir grinding his teeth, the acrid scent of hurt and anger radiating off the alpha in waves. Likely, the only thing holding Fenrir back from openly attacking Remus was the cub in his arms.

“We're not monsters, Remus, we're _wolves_ ,” Harry said, his voice firm and insistent as he gazed at his former professor imploringly. “When we change...we're just that— _animals._ We need to run and hunt like a natural wolf; if you put a wolf in a tiny cage, or tie them up, of _course_ they're going to be agitated, angry, and want to _hurt_ something, but that's just...instinct. If there are no rabbits or deer to chase, and only humans nearby, what would we go after?”

Harry continued to stare pleadingly at Remus, while Fenrir touched his arm, silent, reassuring, and oddly pleased, like he approved of Harry's words. Privately, Harry was markedly _amazed_ that Fenrir hadn't intervened yet, though he could still feel how tense his mate currently was.

“You're—you're just repeating what Greyback told you to say,” Remus said at last, though he sounded uncertain. To Harry, it seemed like a good sign—perhaps given enough time, Remus would actually be _open_ to helping his wolf and his human mind become more harmonious.

It was a stretch, but Harry was certain that he could help Remus get there.

 

~*~

 

Remus didn't know what he was doing here.

Teddy was sleeping contentedly in his arms at last. Little puffs of breath tickled Remus's neck as he hugged his child to his chest. He was still dressed in his little green onesie and wrapped up in a knitted red and gold houndstooth baby blanket. At last, his child was calm, utterly worn out by his Very Bad Day, and the healer, Marie, had even been kind enough to offer him a full jar of the salve, should he start to cry later.

But Harry was staring at him, his eyes brazen and confident—unlike any sub werewolf he'd ever seen before. _No sub_ he'd ever seen had looked this confident or brave. All the subs he had known were during his undercover work for the Order, and they had all been meek, downtrodden, abused, or some variation of the three.

Harry did not look like that.

Harry was still a little skinny from their incarceration (and so was he, if Remus was being honest with himself) but he looked _strong_. His legs were spaced apart, his shoulders were thrown back, and he exuded confidence like a perfume.

He looked more domineering than Remus ever had.

“I am _not_ repeating what Fenrir told me to say,” Harry said at last, his voice firm, with a lilt of offence to his tone. “I've been a werewolf for five months, Remus, and I haven't taken wolfsbane _once_. Do I _look_ sick, weakened, or otherwise in bad shape? What about you?”

Remus ground his teeth as he narrowed his eyes at Harry. Greyback's influence, no doubt, was where this rudeness was coming from. Harry hadn't even been this bad after Fleur and Bill's wedding, when Remus had hurried to Grimmauld Place to check on him and his friends.

Teddy let out a sudden whine of discontent, snapping all three adult werewolves from their standoff.

“I—I should go,” Remus said without answering Harry's accusatory statement. “The moon will rise soon, and...and...I should go.”

“To your _cage_?” Greyback interjected, and Remus felt his face burn, though he refused to acknowledge the brute who had changed Harry into someone he barely recognized.

“Please stay, Remus,” Harry pleaded, stepping forward, and pointedly ignoring Greyback when the brute began to growl. “I haven't even gotten to properly meet Teddy, and this is a safe space for all of us. The warding is strong, ensuring that no humans wander in when we're transformed, and I'll make _certain_ that no one harms you _or_ my godson. And then tomorrow, you can rest here safely, until you feel strong enough to Apparate home.”

“Andromeda will worry if I stay too long,” Remus tried to protest, despite the fact that he'd told Andromeda that he'd be back in the morning. He glanced to the sky, and saw that the sun was little more than an illumination of red and gold on the horizon. He was running out of time.

“We have owls,” Harry offered. “You can send her an owl in the morning.”

Harry continued to gaze at Remus imploringly, even as Greyback continued to growl, apparently annoyed that Harry was so close to him. Remus watched in amazement as Harry kicked back, almost mule-like, and kicked the infamous murderer in the shin, hard enough that he saw Greyback stagger a little.

Remus's eyes widened, his arms tensing as he braced himself to defend Harry from a vicious attack, and when none came, he felt a wave of dizziness overcome him momentarily.

Greyback backed off, and stopped growling.

_What had just happened?_

“I can protect you,” Harry said before Remus could formulate a hypothesis about what had just occurred. “I am Alpha Bitch here, and if I claim you as pack, no one would dare to touch you.”

Greyback smiled—truly _smiled_ at that.

Remus had never seen such an expression upon the man's face—such _warmth_. It was almost as though he'd become a different person in the span of an instant, and the change was staggering.

Greyback stepped up to Harry, and murmured something into his ear, too softly for Remus to catch. He nuzzled at the crook of Harry's neck lovingly, and wrapped a protective arm around Harry's waist, tugging him close.

“My Alpha Bitch is right,” Greyback said, his voice a low rumble. “I won't stand for pissing matches during the moon. You are a visitor, and not expected to fight for rank, so I would not allow my wolves to hurt you, and none but the most stupid would try anything anyway when you have such a young cub nearby. If Harry wants you here, I'll allow it.”

Greyback paused, and levelled Remus with a withering glare as he added, “but if you try anything, I'll rip your bollocks off and feed them to you.”

“ _Fen!_ ”

Harry swatted the alpha, laughing as he flushed with embarrassment. Greyback smirked, apparently pleased by Harry's reaction, and the sub wiggled out of Greyback's hold in order to approach Remus, and touched his arm lightly.

“C'mon,” Harry said, “let me introduce you to everyone.”

 

~*~

 

Fenrir did not like this, not one bit.

However, he wasn't stupid enough to try and protest when his sub was being so territorial, especially this close to moonrise.

Fenrir watched with a tendril of displeasure as Harry led Lupin around the main area of the territory, one hand on the dominant's arm as he spoke to practically everyone in the pack.

Fenrir had tried to follow them at first, but Harry had snapped at them, and he reluctantly backed off, annoyed and confused. Did he just get replaced by Lupin? _In his own territory?_

“Dad, breathe, you're turning colours.”

The sound of his daughter's voice forced a growl from Fenrir, and when he turned to her, he did not see Anaïs like he expected, but her younger sister, Siobhan.

Siobhan hadn't had much contact with Fenrir in the last few months, but then compared to some of her siblings, they hadn't been as close. Fenrir had always been pants at finding common ground with his sub children, and though Siobhan was a sub, she was of a kind who was quietly confident—she knew herself, and knew what she wanted, and didn't let any dominant ever push her around.

“You're freaked out by that new dom, right?” she asked while she pushed her fringe of auburn hair from her eyes, and tucked a strand behind her ear. It didn't seem to help much, as the hair fell almost immediately back into her eyes. Fenrir frowned, uncertain what he'd done to make his daughter suspect such a thing, and didn't answer. “Well, you don't need to be, Dad.”

“You sound pretty certain about that,” Fenrir noted, and his daughter responded with a crooked smile—the exact same smile that Lukas used to bear when he was happy.

“Harry loves you, Dad, and this new one...like, _look_ at him. Look at how Harry stands with him, or how he touches him.”

Fenrir's gaze flicked over to Harry, and his eyes narrowed in confusion. He seemed to be introducing Lupin to Anaïs, and looked so _cheerful_. Did Harry ever look like that with Fenrir? He couldn't remember.

“What's your point?” Fenrir asked at last, and Siobhan laughed warmly, which caused him to scowl. What was so _funny_?

“Dad, you know I love you, but Daddy was right, what he used to say—you are bone-dead _stupid_ when it comes to people,” Siobhan said, shaking her head as she continued to laugh warmly. “Harry treats this new guy like a _father,_ not some new lover. We all see how Harry is with you, so you don't need to make him miserable by harassing the new guy. Okay?”

“I never even _implied_ that I was going to...” Fenrir growled, and his daughter grinned. “Whatever happened to respecting your alpha, eh? You, Sheehan, Ana...you lot just _love_ to swan in and give me all this unwanted advice because Lukas decided it'd be fun to have a bunch of sodding _mind readers_ as children...”

Siobhan burst out laughing.

Her head was thrown back, her hands came to her mouth, and her eyes were squeezed shut, as though Fenrir had told her the funniest joke in the world. Instead of explaining herself, she wandered off, still positively howling as she went.

“Did I miss something?”

Fenrir turned, and relaxed when he saw Harry. He was smiling, and Lupin stood several feet behind him, still looking tense.

“Nothing,” Fenrir grumbled, shooting Siobhan a glare, but she did not seem to see it, given that her eyes still seemed to be shut as she continued to laugh, and to Fenrir's irritation, seemed to be repeating what he'd said to one of her younger sisters, who looked just as amused as Siobhan was.

The sensation of Harry slotting himself into Fenrir's arms drew him from his thoughts, and it filled him with an odd sense of relief. He glanced down to Harry, who was regarding him with a mingled look of curiosity and concern.

“You sure?” Harry asked, cocking his head to the side like a curious cub. Already his green eyes were flecked with more gold than usual, hinting how close moonrise now was. “You look kinda cranky.”

“Just...nothing,” Fenrir grunted, looking away from his sub, and over to Lupin, who was still eyeing him warily. “It doesn't matter what _I_ think, right?”

“Love, what are you talking about?” Harry asked, his eyes widening a little in alarm. He brushed a hand across Fenrir's chest, then around to his back, making the muscles twitch, which only caused his sub to wrap his arms more tightly around Fenrir, his eyes almost owlishly wide, but flooded with concern. “Did _I_ do something wrong? Is that why you're cross?”

Out of anyone else, the latter question may have sounded manipulative, but Harry was just so damn _genuine_. Fenrir wanted to hate it, but his mate sounded so bloody sweet when he spoke like that.

“I'm _not_ cross,” Fenrir insisted, his eyes flitting up to Lupin, who seemed to be teetering between not wanting to listen, and _needing_ to listen, as though he couldn't decide which action to do.

“Oh, I see,” Harry said suddenly, drawing Fenrir's attention back to him, and he saw that Harry was smiling. “I don't feel that way about Remus, you silly sod. He's like a dad to me; I _promise_ he's not competition.”

Fenrir grunted, not quite believing Harry's words. He'd spent the last _hour_ practically clinging to that skinny werewolf. Why else would Harry want to hang around Lupin instead of a strong alpha male, if not to find himself another mate?

Harry shifted, his hands moving to press against Fenrir's chest lightly. Fenrir glanced down to them, uncertain what Harry was doing, and watched Harry's palms slide slowly up his bare chest, teasing the wiry hair as he went until Harry was standing on his tiptoes, and his hands were gently cradling Fenrir's cheeks.

Fenrir opened his mouth to speak, but he was impeded from doing so when Harry kissed him, gently at first, before he pressed harder against his mate, his tongue teasing Fenrir's bottom lip. Fenrir growled, tugging Harry closer, their lips parting and tongues intertwining with a burning need.

Harry stopped sooner than Fenrir would have liked, his lips kiss-swollen and cheeks flushed. His sub smiled, and stroked a hand across his cheek before he shifted his grip again, this time to loop his arms around Fenrir's neck, hugging him close.

“The moon's almost here,” he said, “and it's making all of us antsy. When it sets, I know this possessive mood of yours will calm, but until then, try to trust me, all right? I love you, Fen, and I wouldn't trade you for _anyone_.”

“I...” Fenrir trailed off, his gaze fixed hard on Harry. Soft sentiments were something he'd learnt were weaknesses for a pack alpha, but Harry wasn't like anyone else, not even Lukas, and Fenrir knew that Harry needed to hear it.

“I love you too, Harry.”

His mate beamed, and his arms tightened around Fenrir's neck as he went in for another kiss. Harry tasted like a breath of spring wind after a hard winter, like all the things he had been missing since he lost Lukas, like a perfect peace he'd never known he needed.

As they kissed, Fenrir felt it down to his very core.

Things were finally beginning to be all right again.

 


	24. Baby's First Moon

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: My brain is clogged up with Avengers feels, send help XD Next update will be May 12th, at which time I will have long since passed from this realm...to the land of...MY THIRTIES ;_; (my birthday is May 3rd, lmao)
> 
> **Content Warning: Mild Violence**

Chapter Twenty-Four – Baby's First Moon

 

There was no more time.

Remus cast his gaze to the darkening sky while Teddy gurgled contentedly in his arms, fidgeting, as though he couldn't decide whether or not he wanted to be put down.

“It'll be all right, Remus,” Harry said, his voice warm and welcoming. Remus glanced up, and shivered involuntarily when he saw Greyback standing behind Harry, and he could not help but be reminded of a puppeteer and his marionette, making it say whatever he wanted. He still struggled to believe that Harry truly _wanted_ to be here. However, after discovering what the other Order members had done to Harry, he was loath to do anything that might mirror their actions, even slightly. If Harry was to leave, it had to be of his own accord. “Spend the moon with us—I _promise_ I'll protect you.”

Greyback huffed, as though something in Harry's statement was funny, and Harry swatted his arm without a second thought.

The most amazing part, at least to Remus, was how Greyback did not attack Harry for this, but merely rolled his eyes.

“Even if you don't want to, you have no choice now,” Greyback grunted. “You haven't got enough time to get back to your little werewolf cage. As I said before, no one will harass you. You're a guest, not some prisoner.”

Remus didn't want to agree, but neither did he have any choice. The moon would be rising at any moment—he and Teddy needed to disrobe, lest they get tangled in their garments.

With something not unlike a wolfish growl, Remus tore away from Harry and Greyback and made for the trees.

Distantly, Remus heard Greyback say, “let him go, pet,” and he bristled with newfound anger. _Pet?_ Harry was not his _Pet!_

Remus bottled the indignation, planning to release it later at a more opportune time.

Right now, he needed to help Teddy.

 

Once they had found a tree big enough to serve as both a hiding spot for their modesty, as well as a den for after the transformation, Remus hastily laid Teddy's baby blanket on the ground, and rested Teddy atop it. He stripped the infant of his onesie and nappy, then disrobed himself before he gathered up his naked son in his arms, holding him close in order to keep him warm against the autumn chill.

With his remaining hand, Remus used his wand to move the clothing and blanket into the hollow of the tree, and held Teddy close, rocking him, his eyes on the sky.

 

~*~

 

Harry's eyes stayed on where Remus had hidden himself, and his stomach churned unpleasantly as he tried to decide what to do in order to help him.

“Let him go, pet,” Fenrir said as he rested a hand on Harry's shoulder, and turned him around gently, before he moved in to press a gentle kiss to Harry's lips. “He needs time on his own; going after him now will only instigate him, not aid him in finding some sort of peace. Come, we need to get ready for the moon.”

Harry followed Fenrir reluctantly, unwilling to go far, and continued to glance back at the trees, his expression troubled. Fenrir rubbed his back consolingly, but he did not speak.

Mechanically, Harry divested himself of his clothes. Next to him, he could see Fenrir doing the same. It had felt like it had been ages since Harry had shared a moon with his mate, and when Harry turned to him, handing over his bundle of clothes, he felt little cheer in seeing the glorious nude body of Fenrir Greyback next to him. His worry for Remus eclipsed his usually overwhelming attraction to his mate, though he did not dare remark on it—chances were, Fenrir would misunderstand Harry's meaning, and think that Harry was somehow replacing Fenrir with Remus, which was just ridiculous.

Harry smiled, despite his overwhelm of worries for Remus—Fenrir was a work of art, and as Harry watched his mate walk away with their clothes in hand, the alpha male's leg muscles rippled with every step.

Harry forced his gaze away, flushing a little, though it did little to quash his desire—so close to the moon, it would be impossible to rid himself of his base needs completely.

 

When Fenrir returned to him, Harry immediately folded himself into the dominant's arms, allowing himself to bask in his scent. Fenrir chuckled, and pet his hair affectionately.

“Later, pet,” Fenrir whispered, before he bowed forward to kiss the top of Harry's head. “We haven't time for it at the moment; the moon is nearly here.”

“But the moon makes you smell so _good_...” Harry replied, his voice just as soft, and Fenrir chuckled again as he curled a knuckle beneath Harry's chin, and guided him into a kiss.

“After, I promise,” Fenrir murmured against his lips. “Once the moon is over, I promise to make you _squirm_.”

Harry opened his mouth to respond, but at the same moment, he felt the moon crest the horizon, making his skin grow hot as the change took him.

Fenrir, having clearly expected this, caught him, and guided him to the ground.

The change came as it always did, with a terrible pain, which Fenrir helped Harry through as best he could, rubbing the sub's muscles and talking him down. Fenrir's gentle caresses lessened the agony, but only just.

Distantly, Harry thought he could hear a baby crying. As his wolf mind took over, the sense shifted merely to feeling that the sound was _bad_ with little understanding that it was a baby making the noise. However, the vocalization faded so quickly that Harry supposed that whatever it was, it was not as _bad_ as he had assumed.

As the change completed, Harry stood up to shake himself off before he turned to his mate and immediately bounded towards him. His tongue was lolling out of his mouth as he attempted to leap up at Fenrir, and the much larger wolf merely huffed in amusement, batting him gently with a forepaw, and Harry fell to the ground, exposing his belly, which Fenrir nuzzled affectionately.

Harry barked, wiggling in a halfhearted attempt to escape while he gazed up at his mate, his tail wagging so rapidly that it was little more than a blur. From this angle, he could see Fenrir's underside clearly, which bore several unusual tufts of grey, much more than the last time Harry had seen him like this.

However, in his current form such a thing did not merit more than a passing thought. Harry wiggled out from under Fenrir, shaking himself again before he began to try and instigate his mate in play, just as a tiny wolf cub raced from the woods and directly for them, yipping excitedly as he moved.

The cub was silvery grey with violet eyes, and looked every part a healthy, happy cub. To Harry, the tiny thing smelt like _pack_ , but by the same token, the cub did not smell like _Fenrir's Pack_.

This cub was part of _Harry's Pack_.

The cub raced around Harry, his little pink tongue lolling out of its mouth, just as another wolf emerged from the trees. This particular wolf appeared skinnier than he should be, and he bore a panicked look in his eyes as he moved, as though the concept of being around other werewolves was somehow frightening to him.

Harry nipped gently at the cub in an effort to calm his running, but this small action only made the new wolf panic, and he raced forward to wedge himself between Harry and the cub, his teeth bared.

Harry jumped back, startled, while at the same moment Fenrir shouldered in front of Harry, snarling, clearly angry for this new wolf daring to threaten his mate.

Harry circled the pair of dominants and made a grab for the cub, keen to get him away from the angry wolves, but this only earned him a warning snap from the new wolf. The cub scrambled underneath the new wolf, ears back, and his tail tucked between his tiny legs.

Harry whined as he looked to his mate for guidance. He didn't know what to do; this wolf was not acting like any wolf Harry had ever seen, and everything seemed to agitate him, despite the fact that he smelt familiar, in the same way the cub did—like _pack._ Harry didn't understand; why was this wolf not letting him get close?

Fenrir growled again, lower this time, and moved once more in between Harry and the new wolf. The edges of Harry's human mind told him that this wolf was someone he _should_ know. He could smell the familial blood trying together the new wolf and the cub, and yet Harry's wolf mind did not recognize him beyond a vague recognition that this wolf part of his pack.

Harry cowered behind Fenrir, confused and frustrated while he watched the new wolf close his mouth around his cub's scruff gently, before he carried him back to the copse of trees from where they'd come.

Fenrir only seemed to relax when the wolf disappeared, and Harry circled his mate curiously, nose pointed in the direction of his own pack, which seemed to be both part of and separate from the pack he shared with Fenrir. He knew them all as family, but the wolf and his cub...oddly moreso.

Harry whined, his frustration returning as he tilted his head back, and howled.

Harry's vocalization was answered by the tiny howl of a cub, and Harry felt his heart swell a little as the cub, _Teddy,_ his mind supplied, stumbled out of the trees, and scampered towards Harry happily, with his father lagging behind.

 

~*~

 

Fenrir growled, his fur bristling as the wolf approached them again. There was a kinship between this wolf and his mate, and he could faintly sense that this wolf was _his_ , like he had been the one to sire him, but it was muddled, the scent of him _off_ , somehow.

There was something _wrong_ with this werewolf.

Fenrir stepped in front of Harry, baring his teeth at the older wolf. The cub stumbled to a halt, tripping over himself from his attempt to go from running to stopping in such short order. Once he had managed it, the cub began to bark at Fenrir, as though he was trying to show the alpha male just how big and strong he was.

Fenrir huffed, crouching down a little to nose at the little cub, and the cub let out a yelp as he toppled onto his back, his little tail wagging rapidly, but despite this clear display of contentment, the cub's father raced forward with an angry snarl, as though Fenrir had somehow injured the youngling.

Harry whined with confused distress, rubbing up against Fenrir's side as he gazed at the newcomer, while the wolf grabbed his cub again and hurried away.

Fenrir grunted with annoyance as he watched the retreating werewolf. Predictably, a moment after the wolf had disappeared, the cub escaped yet again, and made a beeline for his mate.

 

Fenrir turned away from Harry and the cub, intending to gather the hunting party, but a defensive snarl once more drew his attention, and he saw that the new wolf had snapped at Harry, and in the span of a breath, his mate had huddled underneath Fenrir like a startled cub.

Fenrir could feel the confusion and fear radiating off his mate, though he knew instinctively that Harry was capable of fending for himself when it was called for.

However, for some unknown reason, his mate refused to face off against this odd-smelling wolf. Perhaps if Fenrir had been in his human form he may have understood the reasons why more clearly, but in his more simple form under the Moon, he knew only that something was making his mate hesitate to show this newcomer his place, and Fenrir knew, instinctually, that his mate would not like it if Fenrir tried to discipline this wolf too harshly. He could sense that this wolf was a visitor, not pack, and he deserved as much respect as the pack wolves, if not the same level of discipline.

However, if the visitor became a danger, then that rule would change in an instant.

Knowing now that he could not abandon Harry with the skittish visitor so close, Fenrir scanned the clusters of wolves until he spotted the Beta.

Without even a vocalization between them, Anaïs seemed to understand, and took to the task of gathering the hunting party, which she led into the woods, far away from the visitor.

Fenrir glanced back, and saw that, _again,_ the visitor was carrying his cub back to his den, and, again, the cub raced out the moment he managed to wiggle free.

Fenrir watched the visitor, and as he tried to stomp down on the fondness he felt of seeing his mate interact with such a young cub, he braced himself for another confrontation with the cub's father, who already appeared on edge.

It was going to be a _long_ night.

 

~*~

 

Harry woke the next morning in a familiar pile of bodies, and let out a small groan as he stretched, joints cracking, and someone near him let out a discontented groan at the sound, and elbowed him.

Harry snorted, fairly certain that someone had been Shannon, and rolled over again to curl up closer to Fenrir, who was holding him tight. After last night, it did not surprise him that his mate was still fast asleep—it had been utter _madness_ keeping Remus in line.

Or trying to, at least.

Harry sighed, and eased back down into the mass of bodies, not quite ready to get up yet. The sky above him was grey, and the air was cold, but the puppy pile offered more than enough warmth, coupled with the ever-burning bonfire in the centre of the territory, which was mere feet from where they lay.

Despite Harry's reluctance to get up, he spotted a familiar figure racing across the territory and towards the Apparition Point with a bundle in his arms. One whom Harry recognized immediately.

Harry let out a tiny huff and wiggled out from under Fenrir. His mate, usually so sensitive to even Harry getting up to pee, hardly reacted.

Harry stepped around the mass of naked bodies, and did not bother to look for clothes as he raced after Remus, knowing that if he stopped to concern himself with covering up, he'd miss his chance.

 

“Leaving so soon?”

Remus spun around, and immediately his face turned a blotchy red of embarrassment.

“For goodness sake, Harry, put on some trousers!” Remus sputtered, and before Harry could say a word, the elder werewolf was waving his wand and he conjured a pair of cotton, drawstring pyjama bottoms onto Harry.

Harry rolled his eyes, but allowed it.

“I'm sorry, Harry,” Remus continued once Harry had been adequately covered up. “But I really must be going. Teddy needs to be fed, and I haven't his baby food here—”

“You know that there are kids here, right? Like, of every age. We could get you anything you need, if you'd only ask,” Harry pointed out, and raised his eyebrows. “You can't get out of here fast enough, can you?”

“After last night, I saw all that I needed,” Remus replied coldly. “I was proven right—Greyback attacked Teddy numerous times, even you in your werewolf form went after him!”

Harry felt mildly sick at the accusation. How could Remus be so _thick_?

“We didn't attack him or hurt him,” Harry replied calmly, “not _once._ You were under the influence of the wolfsbane potion, and I still remember when you told me, Ron, and Hermione about it back in my third year. It allows you to keep your human mind during the moon, which means you were essentially a human in a pack of wolves last night. Even _Teddy_ was nothing more than a natural wolf last night, and _you_ were the one causing problems, not us. You were nervous and protective of Teddy, I get that, I really do, but when we tried to play with Teddy, you saw it as some kind of attack, and you went after us every time we even _tried_ to interact with him.

“Remus,” Harry continued, sighing deeply, and he ran a hand through his hair as he tried to organize his thoughts. “you're like an uncle to me, but if you want to come back next moon, I'm going to have to ask you to _not_ take wolfsbane potion.”

Harry shivered, guilt worming into his mind at the look of horror that crossed Remus's face. It killed him to hurt Remus like this, but for the sake of his pack, he knew that it needed to be said. “When you take it, you're out of sync with your natural instincts, and it causes problems and misunderstandings for the whole pack because you can't anticipate our actions, and we can't anticipate yours. Hell, even _Fen_ had to stay behind to keep an eye on you, instead of leading the hunt like he usually does. And then, to make matters worse, you wouldn't let your _son_ touch the kills that were brought back! It's not fair to any of us, so when—er, _if—_ you come back next moon, please, just don't take the wolfsbane, all right?”

Harry fell silent, his heart racing in his chest, while Remus continued to regard him with a look of horror, as though he had been slapped.

Remus turned away without answering, and Disapparated.

The foliage behind Harry rustled, and Harry smiled faintly as he smelled his mate approaching.

Fenrir's thick, muscled arms wound around Harry's waist, tugging him flush against his chest, and Harry squirmed, laughing a little as Fenrir's nose tickled along the nape of his neck.

“You did well, pet,” Fenrir murmured, his tongue tracing the side of his throat gently. Harry let out a tiny moan, tilting his head to the side to allow Fenrir more access. “I would've said the same thing—that poison he took fucked us all up; I couldn't even recognize him in my wolf skin under the Moon. We're lucky the cub was there, otherwise it probably would've gotten _ugly_.”

“I want to help him,” Harry said with a small, sad sigh, “I want him to be okay with his wolf side, especially for Teddy, but I'm not sure if he's ready for that yet.”

Fenrir tensed his arms around Harry, and Harry bit his lip to stifle a laugh. Really, Fenrir's jealousy shouldn't be funny, but for some odd reason, it _was._

“You still come first, love,” Harry said, turning in Fenrir's arms to grin up at his mate. “You're not being replaced.”

Harry got on his toes to kiss him, and Fenrir let out a soft growl as he picked Harry up, making the sub lock his legs around his mate's waist as they deepened their kiss.

Harry moaned as Fenrir's tongue pressed insistently against his lips. He began to walk forward, until Harry felt his back press up against the trunk of a tree. Perhaps it wasn't the most opportune time, given what had just happened, but Harry didn't care—he felt like after the stressful talk, he _needed_ this.

One of Fenrir's hands moved to Harry's arse, clearly wanting it just as much as Harry did, but growled when he found his way impeded by a thin layer of cotton.

“What the hell are these?” Fenrir grumbled, tugging lightly upon the fabric, and Harry buried his face in the crook of Fenrir's neck as he began to laugh.

“Remus was a little offended by my nudity,” Harry explained between giggles, just as he heard a loud _riiiiiip!_ closely followed by a cool draught across his arse.

“Don't talk about other doms when we're like this,” Fenrir rumbled, his voice teetering between a stern command and a gentle plea. “This is our time, Harry, and I don't care if you're talking of Father fucking Christmas, the only dom's name I want to hear on your lips is mine.”

“I'm all yours, Fen,” Harry murmured, his expression softening a little as he tightened his legs around his mate, and leant in for a gentle kiss. “The only one I want is _you_.”

Fenrir growled again, his vocalization closer to that of a purr while he ripped a bigger hole in the pyjama bottoms. He tore through the fabric like it was made of paper, until at last they fell away from Harry's legs in long strips, and Harry rotated his hips, grinding his budding erection against Fenrir's thick and long one.

“Mine...” Fenrir growled softly, and Harry moaned his assent.

“Yours, only yours...” Harry panted, “please, love, remind me who I belong to.”

“Oh, baby...” Fenrir replied, “with _pleasure._ ”

Fenrir flexed his right arm, and Harry felt a warm rush of werewolf magic as Fenrir brought his suddenly slick fingers towards his arse, and prodded at his hole, making Harry laugh softly at how gentle he was being. Harry had had brushes with Fenrir's gentler side before, but, admittedly, Harry rather liked it better when they went hard and fast.

“Come on, love,” Harry murmured in between heady kisses, “you _know_ you can go harder than that...”

The goad worked, and with another soft growl, Fenrir pushed his slick fingers into Harry, making him tilt his head back and groan.

Fenrir wasted little time preparing him, and soon his fingers were replaced with his delicious cock, and Harry groaned loudly as he welcomed the burn, their mouths locking together in a heated kiss.

Fenrir held fast to Harry, using the tree for leverage as he pulled out and thrust back in, making the sub hiss in both pleasure and pain as his bare skin scraped against the tree, but he was enjoying himself far too much to even _dare_ to tell his mate to stop.

Fenrir pounded into him, his grunts and groans of pleasure lost in the connection of their mouths, panting as one as Harry felt his back get scratched all to hell, but it felt so good, so _freeing_ , this push-pull of pain and pleasure.

Harry came almost embarrassingly quickly, and he whimpered as his seed sputtered over Fenrir's abdomen.

Harry smiled in a dazed, dopey sort of way, while Fenrir pounded into Harry harder, growling as he found his release before he pulled Harry down to the ground.

Fenrir turned his sub around into a spooning position before he ripped away the remaining tatters of Harry's pyjama bottoms. Again, Fenrir employed the use of his werewolf magic, this time to heal the scratches and scuff marks on Harry's back.

Once Harry was healed, Fenrir pulled him close and pressed a kiss to the top of Harry's shoulder.

“That was good,” Harry said, panting a little. Fenrir was still inside him, his cock softening, making Harry think of Breeding Season, when they'd be able to go at it for _days_ without stopping.

On impulse, Harry touched his flat stomach.

Part of Harry deeply wished it _was_ Breeding Season, but not from the allure of being able to have wild sex for days on end. He didn't dare mention it; Fenrir had given him time and space to heal from the terrible loss of their cubs, and it would not be fair to push him about it, either.

“Thank you, pet, but I know how good I am,” Fenrir replied, drawing Harry from his thoughts and making him snort.

“Yes, you're a _brilliant_ shag, love,” Harry said sarcastically, and inclined his head to look at the dominant. “Better?”

Fenrir chuckled, and kissed his shoulder again before he moved to his neck, and licked a few dots of sweat from the skin he found there.

“I've been thinking,” Fenrir said suddenly, his tone shifting abruptly from light to serious, and Harry's jovial post-shag mood dimmed a little at his mate's tone.

“Yeah? What about?” Harry asked, his voice tentative, and Fenrir's arms tensed around him.

“Breeding Season is in two months...”

“Yeah...” Harry replied, and bit his lip. Did Fenrir want him to go on some sort of magical birth control for it? Was that what he was trying to say?

“Well...I know you said you wanted to try again, and I think I want that too,” Fenrir admitted, his tone gruff, but soft, as though his show of emotion was making him feel uncomfortable. “So...if you want it...I want it.”

Harry rolled over, and immediately moved in to kiss Fenrir tenderly, both in gratitude for his willingness to try, and for being so open with him.

“Oh, Fen, I _do_ want that. I want it so badly,” Harry said, punctuating his words with more kisses. “What changed your mind?”

“Lupin's cub, funnily enough,” Fenrir muttered, chuckling weakly. “Him being here, seeing you with such a young cub...apart from his ruddy father causing so much chaos last night, it was...nice. Seeing you with a cub. I want to have that with you, Harry, and you deserve a chance to be a parent, not just have that memory of...what happened.”

Tears in his eyes, Harry pulled Fenrir close, and kissed him hard. Harry felt his dominant smile into the kiss, and hold him close.

A sense of safety overwhelmed Harry in that moment, and he hoped that if they _did_ try again, he'd be able to keep his cub safe, and see them born healthy.

This time, things would be different.

This time, he wouldn't leave Fenrir.

Not for a second.

 


End file.
